Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-8ctnn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-24T17:55:26.009Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The generals in The Hellespont, 410–407 B.C.

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

A. Andrewes
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The course of Athenian military operations after the battle of Kyzikos is not to be explained by considerations of strategy alone. Immediately after their victory the Athenian commanders acted briskly enough, building a fort and instituting a tithe at Chrysopolis, but instead of following up the annihilation of Mindaros' fleet by the capture of Sparta's bases on land, they then lapsed into an inactivity hard to excuse in generals who had just shown such capacity in action, and apparently alien to the temperament of Alkibiades. The whole history of Greek naval warfare shows that no power can maintain control of the sea while the nearby seaboard remains in the hands of the enemy, and by thus neglecting the coastal towns Athens allowed Sparta bases in the Hellespont for the ships which Pasippidas and Klearchos collected from the allies (Xen. Hell. I 1. 32, 36, 3. 17) and even opportunity for new construction (ibid. 1. 25–6, 3. 17). The Hellespont was in any case vital to Athens, the area in which a defeat could lose the whole war for her, yet though Thrasyllos had gone home months before the battle to get reinforcements for the Hellespont, nothing was sent there, and when Thrasyllos did collect a force he took it to Ionia.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 73 , November 1953 , pp. 2 - 9
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1953

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 The decisive argument (cf. Beloch, , Gr. Gesch. II 2, 2. 274Google Scholar) lies in Kyros' movements, which show that his meeting with Lysandros was fairly early in the year. Lysandros, then, crossed to Ionia in spring, and in Xenophon's connecting phrase, Hell. I 5. 1 the reference of τούτων is not to Alkibiades' autumn voyage to Samos (I 4. 23) but to the whole episode of his return to Athens (I 4. 8–23). But if in spring, thenin spring 407—spring 408 would allow far too much time to Lysandros and Kallikratidas before Arginousai in August 406—and 407 must also be the year of Alkibiades' summer in Athens. The arguments set out by Ferguson, in CAH V 483–5Google Scholar, and added to in his Treasurers of Athena 38–45, are cumulatively powerful, but something must be subtracted for Xen. Hell. I 4. 7, which is unequivocally against his chronology and only to be countered by saying that Xenophon was mistaken (unless one is prepared to read for ). Androtion F 45 Jac. is no help as the text stands. For the alternative chronology (Thrasyllos in Ionia 410, Hellespont campaign 409, Alkibiades in Athens 408) see Busolt, , Gr. Gesch. III 2, 1529–32Google Scholar, Kahrstedt, , Forschungen 162 ff.Google Scholar

2 Ferguson, , Treasurers 39.Google Scholar

3 E.g. Hatzfeld, , Alcibiade 277–8Google Scholar, who ends by taking the inactivity of 410/9 merely as a fact to be used for the evaluation of Alkibiades' character.

4 Gilbert, , Beiträge zur innern Geschichte Athens 354–5Google Scholar, and Beloch, , Attische Politik 72, 77, 81Google Scholar, Gr. Gesch. II2, 1. 391, 413, 2. 267, have developed the idea that the generals elected by the fleet at Samos in summer 411 continued for some years as a distinct board side by side with the boards of generals annually and normally appointed at Athens. To this form of the theory it may reasonably be objected that fleet and city were reconciled in autumn 411 (e.g., Meyer, , Gesch. d. Altert. IV 1, 601Google Scholar), or that the city's generals received money at Samos in 410/9 (e.g., Hatzfeld, , REA XL (1938), 117Google Scholar), but what I want to do is, so to speak, to take a fresh start at the point when full democracy was restored in summer 410. It has often been recognised that Alkibiades' position was irregular in these years—Hatzfeld 118 calls him ‘stratége “à la gauche” du collège athénien’—and I wish to suggest that his colleagues in the Hellespont were equally irregular.

5 Theramenes' part in this is more heavily emphasised in Diodoros (XIII 38. 2, 42. 2) than in Thucydides or Xenophon. Diodoros' source—since the new fragments of the Hellenica Oxyrhynchia were published, it is still more evident that this was ultimately Kratippos—is throughout deeply interested in Theramenes, and friendly to him even after Arginousai.

6 I mean, his ambition to be the freely but effectively acknowledged leader of a democratic Athens. The trouble with Alkibiades was that he wanted Perikles' position without undergoing Perikles' apprenticeship or modifying the style of his personal amusements.

7 Kritias' decree recalling Alkibiades (Plut. Alc. 33. 1) is generally referred to 411 (recently, Wade-Gery, , CQ XXXIX (1945), 24 n. 3Google Scholar), but I am not sure I agree, for a fresh decree in 408/7 would certainly have been a comfort to Alkibiades even if not technically necessary, and I do not like merely to dismiss Xen. Hell. I 4. 10 (quoted above). Kritias' words are is it straining them too far to suggest that means the full demos, not the 5000, or that the second line means Alkibiades actually reached home this time? Plutarch's means only that the decree was passed in an earlier assembly than the one which Alkibiades is now addressing. There is the further point that certain necessary acts had not been performed in 411, notably the lifting of the curse—not that the curse deterred the fleet from electing him in 411, but that was an emergency, the Eumolpidai were not available, and in 411 he did not set foot in Attica whereas in 407 he had to take up an official position in the city.

8 Thuc. VIII 81. 1,

9 For details, see below under Neapolis and Thasos. Diod. XIII 49. 1, just before Kyzikos, describes him as but the original intention was probably to distinguish Theramenes' squadron from the main fleet, not to designate Thrasyboulos as commander-in-chief.

10 Most historians seem to accept it without surprise, but Ferrabino, , L'impero ateniese 391–2Google Scholar, is an exception.

11 According to the received text of Xen. Hell. I 2. 13, just before joining Alkibiades, Thrasyllos captured and stoned to death Alkibiades' cousin and namesake. This seems incredible, and of the degree of factual improbability that justifies emendation. Wolf proposed for κατέλευσεν. Prof. Wade-Gery points out to me that the singular κατέλευσεν is unusual, and suggests on the analogy of I 5. 19

12 Lysias XII 66, speaking before a democratic court and exerting himself to diminish Theramenes' credit, puts it in the form that Theramenes out of fear and envy (Aristotle, 33. 2 names Aristokrates and Theramenes in that order as ) It is nonsense, as Wilamowitz, , Ar. u. Ath. I 100Google Scholar n. 3 pointed out, to make Aristokrates an ‘aristocrat’ in politics on the strength of the pun in Ar. Aves 126. His position is more clearly reflected in the fact that he was one of those who swore to the Peace of Nikias and the Spartan alliance of 421, Thuc. V 19. 2, 24. 1.

13 The name of Eumachos, one of the minor Hellespontine, generals (Xen.-Hell. I 1. 22)Google Scholar would fill the gap in IG I2, 304. 35–6, a general's name beginning with E (Hatzfeld, , REA XL (1938), 116 n. 3Google Scholar: Meritt, , AFD 96Google Scholar, allows space for a name of 8, not 7, letters, but cf. plates V–VI, which leave the question at least doubtful). But seven-letter names in E …… are not so uncommon that we need accept the restoration and make this colleague of Theramenes a general for 410/9.

13a I use the revised texts given by Meritt, , AFD, 94–6, 119–22, 160–3Google Scholar for IG I2 304A, 304B 302.

14 Except the first three payments of prytany VII. The three (see below) are noted as such, but their eventual purpose is not stated.

15 For the singling out of one or two hellenotamiai before 409, cf. IG I2, 365. 15–16, 366. 16 (see ATL II T72 d-e, III 329–32: receipts, not payments) in 435/4, 434/3; 302. 11–12, 31–2, 62–3, 77–9 in 418/4; 304A. 4 in 410. Presumably there was always a connexion between particular hellenotamiai and particular payments, but it was not regularly recorded till 409. There seems to be no significance in the occasional omission of tempting as it is in the case of IG I2, 304A. 20, to suppose that a hellenotamias was detached to Samos (cf. Ferguson, , Treasurers, 23Google Scholar n. 1): if the omission meant that, IG I2, 302. 77–9 would almost certainly compel Philomelos to be in two places at once. Cf. IG I2, 301 generally, 304B. 74–5, 85–6.

16 There is a possible contrary instance in IG I2, 304B (407/6), where Protarchos received three payments for the diobelia in prytany II (Il. 47–50, 61–3), and apparently a payment in prytany X (11. 83–5), but before deciding whether this slightly uncertain case invalidates the hypothesis, it is worth trying it out on 304A. (For Thorikos cf. Xen. Hell. I. 2. 1.)

17 The date can hardly be the date of payment to the generals and trierarchs, who had presumably scattered for conceivably the date when the whole sum was assembled at Samos; more probably the date when it was entered on the books at Athens, for by Prytany IX 36 Thrasyllos should have begun actual operations (cf. Xen. Hell. I 2. 1, 4).

18 They are not to be discovered lurking among the unidentified payments of prytanies VI–X, for no conceivable combination of unidentified sums is large enough to be connected with the upkeep of their fleet.

19 Similarly, , in IG I 2, 304BGoogle Scholar (407/6) one might associate Lysitheos with the diobelia, rather than make him chairman as (tentatively) ATL I, 570: he occurs in each surviving prytany, and in II of 407/6 and I of 406/5 it is the diobelia he is paid for.

20 If the number of horses is constant, the quantity of grain should be constant, though the price would vary seasonally. The recorded payments reveal no system: they probably reflect the financial difficulties of the tamiai.

21 Xen. Hell. I 1. 32 speaks of a revolution in Thasos (in 410?—the chronology is in his most disjointed style) in which the Laconisers and the Spartan harmost were thrown out: subsequently Pasippidas was charged at Sparta with having engineered the revolt in conspiracy with Tissaphernes. This revolution has often been connected with Thrasyboulos' activities (in which case Thasos must have excluded the forces of both sides till 407, or another and unattested revolution must have brought the laconisers back before 407), but Beloch's protest against is surely justified (Gr. Gesch. II2, 2. 246, Philol. XLIII (1884), 268: what would Tissaphernes gain by turning the Spartans out of Thasos, which was beyond his own reach?), and Kahrstedt's proposal of (Forschungen 176 n. 17) gives a satisfactory alternative, a city which Tissaphernes might hold for himself.

22 For the text and interpretation of IG I2 108 see Meritt, and Andrewes, in BSA XLVI (1951), 200–9.Google Scholar I use our numbering of the lines.

23 For their restoration and disposition see Wade-Gery, , Num. Chron. 1930 16–38Google Scholar: for Wade-Gery's revised figures in Il. 103–8, ibid. 333–4.

24 Part or all of it might have come in during 410/9, but it does not seem very likely, and is certainly not necessary. Similarly, some of the staters of Il. 92–103, 120–3 might have come in from the Hellespont, but need not: staters, especially Kyzikene, might arrive from many places besides the area of their origin.

25 I assume the loan is prospective. It is unlikely that any force from the city had visited Neapolis in the summer of 410, and the general tone of the decree makes it unlikely that the Neopolitans are trying to interest the city in the repayment of money they had lent Thrasyboulos, so the transaction is probably still in the future, a matter of helping with the maintenance of any troops the city could manage to send.

26 The non-Attic inscriptions rather need elucidation from this history than contribute to its disentanglement. Briefly, I note the following: (a) IG XII, 8. 262 (cf. Picard, , Rev. Phil. (1912), 30Google Scholar, noted in IG XII, suppl. p. 150) needs a longer line, is not securely dated, and seems to me to belong to the restoration of democracy rather than the establishment of an oligarchy, (b) IG XII 5. 109 (cf. Feyel, , Rev. Phil. XIX (1945), 141–52Google Scholar) is a treaty of reconciliation (cf. Il. 12–13 ) involving Thasos, Neapolis, and some non-Thasians living in Thasos (l. 25, cf. 17) who may be Neo-politans: Paros may be the mediator of the treaty, not a party to it, and I should be surprised if it belonged to 411. (c) IG XII, 8. 264 (cf. Wilhelm, , Neue Beiträge II 30Google Scholar—his text is in IG XII, suppl. p. 152—Feyel, loc. cit. 133–41) under a democratic constitution admits a group of persons to privileges at Thasos: Wilhelm guessed they were Neopolitans. (d) IG XII, 8. 263 (now rediscovered, Picard, , BCH XLV (1921), 145Google Scholar, cf. IG XII, suppl. p. 151) records the confiscation of the property of Apemantos and other Thasians, also of two Neopolitans, by order of the 300: this is no doubt the Apemantos, of IG II 2, 6Google Scholar (cf. II2, 33. 26). The theoroi of XII, 8. 263 reappear in the catalogue XII, 8. 277D. 81–3. (e) The 360 of XII 8. 276 cannot, as the lists appear to run, have any very close connexion with the 300 of XII, 8. 263, nor does it seem a priori likely that bodies called ‘the 300’ and ‘the 360’ should occupy this sort of position simultaneously. But the principles and arrangement of the catalogues of the theoroi are far from clear.

27 The surface at the beginning of l. 16 is very worn: is clear enough from a squeeze, fainter treces agree with the letters given in IG I2, and one might be tempted to add the δ. No distinction in status between the two sets of generals can be deduced from the phrasing (for cf. IG II2, 17. 26–7).

28 I wish to express my great gratitude to the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, where this article was written, and especially to Prof. B. D. Meritt, who gave me most valuable help. I am also grateful for suggestions from Prof. H. T. Wade-Gery, Mr. N. G. L. Hammond, and Mr. D. M. Lewis. Prof. Wade-Gery draws my attention to Lysias XX 21, a reference to supporters of the 5000 who were with the fleet at the time of speaking; and XX 29, presumably men who had come home with Thrasyllos.