Opening…

Chapter LXXXIII

SICILIAN AFFAIRS (continued). — FROM THE DESTRUCTION OF THE CARTHAGINIAN ARMY BY PESTILENCE BEFORE SYRACUSE, DOWN TO THE DEATH OF DIONYSIUS THE ELDER. B. C. 394-367.

Frequent occurrence of pestilence among the Carthaginians, not extending to the Greeks in Sicily. — Mutiny among the mercenaries of Dionysius — Aristoteles their commander is sent away to Sparta. — Difficulties of Dionysius arising from his mercenaries — heavy burden of paying them. — Dionysius reëstablishes Messênê with new inhabitants. — Conquests of Dionysius in the interior of Sicily. — Alarm at Rhegium — Dionysius attacks the Sikel town of Tauromenium — desperate defence of the Sikels — Dionysius is repulsed and nearly slain. — Agrigentum declares against Dionysius — reäppearance of the Carthaginian army under Magon. — Expedition of Dionysius against Rhegium — he fails in surprising the town — he concludes a truce for one year. — Magon again takes the field at Agyrium — is repulsed by Dionysius — truce concluded. — Dionysius again attacks Tauromenium — captures it, drives out the Sikels, and plants new inhabitants. — Plans of Dionysius against the Greek cities in Southern Italy — great pressure upon these cities from the Samnites and Lucanians of the interior. — Alliance contracted among the Italiot Greeks, for defence both against the Lucanians and against Dionysius — Dionysius allies himself with the Lucanians. — Dionysius attacks Rhegium — the Rhegines save the Krotoniate fleet — fleet of Dionysius ruined by a storm. — Defeat of the inhabitants of Thurii by the Lucanians — Leptines with the fleet of Dionysius off Läus — his conduct towards the survivors. — Fresh expedition of Dionysius against the Italiot Greeks — his powerful armament — he besieges Kaulonia. — United army of the Italiot Greeks advances to relieve the place — their advanced guard is defeated, and Helôris the general slain. — The whole army is defeated and captured by Dionysius. — Generous lenity of Dionysius towards the prisoners. — Dionysius besieges Rhegium — he grants to them peace on severe terms. — He captures Kaulonia and Hipponium — inhabitants transported to Syracuse — territory made over to Lokri. — Artifices of Dionysius to impoverish and disarm the Rhegines. — He besieges Rhegium — desperate defence of the town under the general Phyton — Surrender of the place from famine, after a blockade of eleven months. — Cruel treatment of Phyton by Dionysius. — Strong sympathy excited by the fate of Phyton. — Rhegium dismantled — all the territory of the southern Calabrian peninsula united to Lokri. — Peace of Antalkidas — ascendent position of Sparta and of Dionysius — Kroton conquered by Dionysius — Splendid robe taken from the temple of Hêrê. — Schemes of Dionysius for transmarine colonies and conquests, in Epirus and Illyria. — Dionysius plunders the coast of Latium and Etruria, and the rich temple of Agylla. — Immense power of Dionysius — his poetical compositions. — Olympic festival of 384 B. C., the first after the peace of Antalkidas — Dionysius sends thither a splendid legation — also chariots to run — and poetical compositions to be recited. — Feelings of the crowd at the festival — Dikon of Kaulonia. — Harangue of Lysias at the festival against Dionysius, in reference to the political state of the Grecian world, and the sufferings of the enslaved Sicilians. — Hatred of the past, and fear of the future conquests of Dionysius, both prevalent. — Lysias exhorts his hearers to destroy the tents of the Syracusan legation at Olympia, as an act of retribution against Dionysius. — Explosion of antipathy against the poems of Dionysius recited at Olympia — insults heaped upon his name and person. — Excessive grief, wrath, and remorse, of Dionysius on hearing of this manifestation against him — his suspicions and cruelties. — Marked and singular character of the manifestation against Dionysius. — Plato visits Syracuse — is harshly treated by Dionysius — acquires great influence over Dion. — New constructions and improvements by Dionysius at Syracuse. — Intention of Dionysius to renew the war with Carthage. — War with Carthage — Victory of Dionysius over the Carthaginian army under Magon. — Second battle with the Carthaginians at Kronium, in which Dionysius is defeated with terrible loss. — He concludes peace with Carthage, on terms very unfavorable to himself: all the territory west of the river Halykus is surrendered to Carthage: he covenants to pay tribute to Carthage. — Affairs of Southern Italy: wall across the Calabrian peninsula projected, but not executed. — Relations of Dionysius with Central Greece. — New war undertaken by Dionysius against Carthage. He is at first successful, but is ultimately defeated near Lilybæum, and forced to return home. — Dionysius gains the prize of tragedy at the Lenæan festival at Athens. His joy at the news. He dies of fever soon afterwards. — Character of Dionysius. 1-54

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Chapter LXXXIV

SICILIAN AFFAIRS AFTER THE DEATH OF THE ELDER DIONYSIUS — DIONYSIUS THE YOUNGER — AND DION.

Family left by Dionysius at his death. — Dion — his connection with the Dionysian family. — Personal character of Dion. — Plato, Dion, and the Pythagorean philosophers. — Extraordinary influence of Plato upon Dion. — Dion learns to hate the Dionysian despotism — he conceives large political and reformatory views. — Alteration of habits in Dion — he brings Plato into communication with Dionysius. — Dion maintains the good opinion and confidence of Dionysius, until the death of the latter — his visits to Peloponnesus. — Death of the elder Dionysius — divergences of interest between the two lines of family. — The younger Dionysius succeeds his father — his character. — Conduct of Dion — he submits to the younger Dionysius — gives him frank and wholesome advice. — Dion acquires great influence and estimation from Dionysius. — Recall of Philistus from exile. — Dion tries to work upon the mind of Dionysius towards a freer political government and mental improvement. — His earnest exhortations produced considerable effect, inspiring Dionysius with a strong desire to see and converse with Plato. — Invitation sent to Plato, both by Dion and by Dionysius. — Hesitation of Plato — he reluctantly consents to visit Syracuse. — Plato visits Syracuse — unbounded deference and admiration manifested towards him at first by Dionysius — Fear and hatred felt by Philistus and other courtiers. — Injudicious manner in which Plato dealt with Dionysius. — Strenuous exhortations addressed by Plato and Dion to Dionysius, to reform himself. — Plato damps the inclination of Dionysius towards Political good. — If Plato had tried to impel Dionysius towards a good practical use of his power, Dionysius might at that time have obeyed him with the aid of Dion. — Difficulties which they would have encountered in trying to realize beneficent projects. — Intrigues by Philistus and others to set Dionysius against Plato and Dion. — Relations between Dionysius and Dion — natural foundation for jealousy on the part of Dionysius. — Dionysius loses his inclinations towards political improvements — comes to hate Dion. — Banishment of Dion from Syracuse to Italy. — Dionysius retains Plato in the acropolis, but treats him well, and tries to conciliate his esteem. — He dismisses Plato — then recalls him — second visit of Plato to Syracuse — his dissatisfaction — Dionysius refuses to recall Dion. — Dionysius confiscates the property of Dion — mortification of Plato, who with difficulty obtains leave to depart from Syracuse. — Resolution of Dion to avenge himself on Dionysius, and to force his way back to Syracuse by arms. — Plato rejoins Dion in Peloponnesus — exasperation of Dion — Dionysius gives his sister Aretê, the wife of Dion, in marriage to Timokrates. — Means of auxiliaries of Dion — Plato — the Academy — Alkimenes. Dion musters his force at Zakynthus. — Small force of Dion against the prodigious power of Dionysius. Resolution of Dion to conquer or perish. — Circumstances which told against Dionysius — discontent at Syracuse. — Herakleides exiled from Syracuse — he projects an attack upon Dionysius, at the same time as Dion. — Weakness of character — dissolute and drunken habits — of Dionysius himself. — Alarm of the soldiers of Dion at Zakynthus, when first informed that they were going against Dionysius. — Eclipse of the moon — religious disquietude of the soldiers — they are reassured by the prophet Miltas — fortunate voyage from Zakynthus to Sicily. — Dion lands at Herakleia — he learns that Dionysius with a large fleet has just quitted Syracuse for Italy. — March of Dion from Herakleia to Syracuse. — Dion crosses the river Anapus, and approaches the gates of Syracuse. — Mistake of Timokrates, left as governor of Syracuse in the absence of Dionysius. — General rising of the Syracusans to welcome and assist Dion. Timokrates is obliged to evacuate the city, leaving Ortygia and Epipolæ garrisoned. — Entry of Dion into Achradina — joy of the citizens — he proclaims liberty. — Dion presents himself at the Pentapyla in front of Ortygia — challenges the garrison of Ortygia to come out and fight — is chosen general by the Syracusans, with his brother Megakles. — Dion captures Epipolæ and Euryalus. He erects a cross-wall from sea to sea, to block up Ortygia. — Return of Dionysius to Syracuse. He tries to negotiate with Dion and the Syracusans — deceives them by fallacious propositions. — Sudden sally made by Dionysius to surprise the blockading wall — great bravery, efforts, and danger of Dion — he at length repulses the attack and recovers the wall. — Ortygia is again blocked up by land — efforts of Dionysius with his fleet — arrival of Herakleides from Peloponnesus with a fleet to coöperate against Dionysius. — Arrival of Philistus with his fleet to the aid of Dionysius. Battle in the Great Harbor between the fleet of Philistus and that of the Syracusans — Philistus is defeated and slain. — Intrigues of Dionysius against Dion in Syracuse. — Relationship of Dion to the Dionysian dynasty — suspicions entertained against him by the Syracusans — his haughty manners. Rivalry of Herakleides. — Herakleides is named admiral. Dion causes him to be deposed, and then moves himself for his re-appointment. — Intrigues and calumnies raised against Dion in Syracuse, by the management of Dionysius. — Mistrust of Dion by the Syracusans, mainly in consequence of his relationship to the Dionysian family. Calumnies of Sôsis. — Farther propositions of Dionysius. He goes away from Ortygia to Italy, leaving his son Apollokrates in command of the garrison. — Increased dissension between Dion and Herakleides — Dion is deposed and his soldiers deprived of the pay due to them — new generals are named. — Dion is forced to retreat from Syracuse — bad conduct of the new generals and of the people towards his soldiers. — Dion reaches Leontini — the Leontines stand by him against the Syracusans — arrival of Nypsius with a reinforcement to the Dionysian garrison in Ortygia. — Advantage gained by Herakleides and the Syracusans over Nypsius as he came into Ortygia — extravagant confidence in Syracuse — Nypsius sallies from Ortygia, and forces his way into Neapolis and Achradina. — Danger and distress of the Syracusans — they send to Leontini to invoke the aid of Dion. — Assembly at Leontini — pathetic address of Dion. — Reluctance of Herakleides to let Dion into Syracuse — renewed assault from Nypsius — unanimous prayers now sent to invite Dion. — Entrance of Dion into Syracuse — he draws up his troops on Epipolæ. Frightful condition of the city. — Dion drives back Nypsius and his troops into Ortygia — he extinguishes the flames, and preserves Syracuse. — Universal gratitude on the part of the Syracusans, towards Dion. Herakleides and Theodotes throw themselves upon his mercy. — Dion pardons Herakleides — his exposition of motives. — Remarkable features in this act of Dion. — Dion re-establishes the blockade of Ortygia, and ransoms the captives taken. — Dion is named general on land, at the motion of Herakleides, who is continued in his command of the fleet. — Attempt to supersede Dion through Gæsylus the Spartan — good conduct of Gæsylus. — Surrender of Ortygia by Apollokrates to Dion. — Entry of Dion into Ortygia — restoration of his wife — speedy death of his son. — Conduct of Dion in the hour of triumph. — Suspicions previously entertained respecting Dion — that he was aiming at the despotism for himself — confirmed by his present conduct. — He retains his dictatorial power, with the fortress and garrison of Ortygia — he grants no freedom to Syracuse. — Intention of Dion to constitute himself king, with a Lykurgean scheme of government and discipline. — Mistake of Dion as to his position. — Dion takes no step to realise any measure of popular liberty. — Opposition raised against Dion by Herakleides — impatience of the Syracusans to see the demolition of the Dionysian strongholds and funeral monument. — Dion causes Herakleides to be privately slain. — Increased oppressions of Dion — hatred entertained against him in Syracuse. — Disquietude and irritability of Dion on account of his unpopularity. — Conspiracy of Kallippus against him — artifices and perjury. — Kallippus causes Dion to be assassinated. — Life, sentiments, and altered position, of Dion. 54-128

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Chapter LXXXV

SICILIAN AFFAIRS DOWN TO THE CLOSE OF THE EXPEDITION OF TIMOLEON. B. C. 353-336.

Position and prospects of Kallippus, after the assassination of Dion. — He continues master of Syracuse more than a year. His misrule. Return of Hipparinus son of Dionysius to Syracuse. Expulsion of Kallippus. — Miserable condition of Syracuse and Sicily, as described by Plato. — Plato’s recommendations fruitless — state of Syracuse grows worse. Dionysius returns to Ortygia, expelling Hipparinus. — Drunken habits of the Dionysian princes. — Lokri — dependency and residence of the younger Dionysius. — Sufferings of the Italiot Greeks from the Lucanians and Bruttians of the interior. — Dionysius at Lokri — his unpopularity and outrageous misrule — cruel retaliation of the Lokrians upon his female relatives. — Distress of the Syracusans — fresh danger from Carthage. They invoke the aid of Hiketas — in concert with Hiketas, they send to entreat aid from Corinth. Secret alliance of Hiketas with the Carthaginians — he conspires to defeat the application to Corinth. — Application from Syracuse favorably received by the Corinthians — vote passed to grant aid. — Difficulty in finding a Corinthian leader — most of the leading citizens decline — Timoleon is proposed and chosen. — Antecedent life and character of Timoleon. — His conduct towards his brother Timophanes, whose life he saves in battle. — Timophanes makes himself despot, and commits gross oppression — Timoleon with two companions puts him to death. — Beneficial effects of the act upon Corinth — sentiment towards Timoleon. — Bitter reproach of Timoleon by his mother. — Intense mental distress of Timoleon. He shuts himself up and retires from public life. — Different judgments of modern and ancient minds on the act of Timoleon. Comments of Plutarch. — Timoleon is appointed commander to Syracuse — he accepts the command — admonition of Telekleides. — Preparations made by Timoleon — his scanty means — he engages some of the Phokian mercenaries. — Bad promise of the expedition — second message from Hiketas, withdrawing himself from the Corinthian alliance, and desiring that no troops might be sent to Sicily. — Timoleon sets out for Sicily with a small squadron — favorable omens from the gods. — Timoleon arrives at Rhegium — is prevented from reaching Sicily by a Carthaginian fleet of superior force — insidious message from Hiketas. — Stratagem of Timoleon to get across to Sicily, in collusion with the Rhegines. — Public meeting in Rhegium — Timoleon and the Carthaginians both present at it — long speeches, during which Timoleon steals away, contriving to send his fleet over to Sicily. — Timoleon at Tauromenium in Sicily — formidable strength of his enemies — despots in Sicily — despondency in Syracuse. — Success of Timoleon at Adranum. He surprises and defeats the troops of Hiketas, superior in number. — Improved position and alliances of Timoleon — he marches up to the walls of Syracuse. — Position of Dionysius in Ortygia — he resolves to surrender that fortress to Timoleon, stipulating for safe conveyance and shelter at Corinth. — Timoleon sends troops to occupy Ortygia, receiving Dionysius into his camp. — Timoleon sends news of his success to Corinth, with Dionysius himself in a trireme. — Great effect produced at Corinth — confidence of the citizens — reinforcement sent to Timoleon. — Sight of the fallen Dionysius at Corinth — impression made upon the Greeks — numerous visitors to see him. Conversation with Aristoxenus. — Immense advantage derived by Timoleon from the possession of Ortygia — numerous stores found in it. — Large Carthaginian army under Magon arrives to aid in attacking Ortygia. Defeated by Neon, during the absence of Magon and Hiketas. Neon acquires Achradina, and joins it by a line of wall to Ortygia. — Return of Magon and Hiketas to Syracuse — increased difficulty of their proceedings, since the victory of Neon. — Return of Timoleon to Syracuse — fortunate march and arrival of the Corinthian reinforcement. — Messênê declares in favor of Timoleon. — He establishes his camp near Syracuse. — Magon distrusts Hiketas and his position at Syracuse — he suddenly withdraws his army and fleet, leaving Syracuse altogether. — Timoleon masters Epipolæ and the whole city of Syracuse — Hiketas is obliged to escape to Leontini. — Languid defence made by the troops of Hiketas. — Great effect produced by the news that Timoleon was master of Syracuse. — Extraordinary admiration felt towards Timoleon — especially for the distinguished favor shown to him by the gods. — Timoleon ascribes all his success to the gods. — Temptations of Timoleon in the hour of success — easy possibility of making himself despot of Syracuse. — Timoleon invited the Syracusans to demolish the Dionysian stronghold in Ortygia. — He erects courts of justice on the site. — Desolate condition of Syracuse and other cities in Sicily. Recall of exiles. Application on the part of Timoleon and the Syracusans to Corinth. — Commissioners sent from Corinth to Syracuse — they revive the laws and democracy enacted by Dioklês — but with various changes and additions. — Poverty at Syracuse — necessity for inviting new colonists. — Large body of new colonists assembled at Corinth for Sicily. — Influx of new colonists into Sicily from all quarters. — Relief to the poverty of Syracuse. — Successes of Timoleon against Hiketas, Leptines, and other despots in Sicily — Hiketas invites the Carthaginians again to invade Sicily. — The Carthaginians land in Sicily with a vast army, including a large proportion of native troops. — Timoleon marches from Syracuse against the Carthaginians — mutiny of a portion of his mercenaries under Thrasius — Timoleon marches into the Carthaginian province — omen about the parsley. — He encounters the Carthaginian army while passing the Krimêsus. War chariots in their front — Timoleon orders his cavalry to charge. — Strenuous battle between the infantry of Timoleon and the native Carthaginian infantry. Terrible storm — complete victory of Timoleon. — Severe loss of the Carthaginians in the battle, especially of their native troops. Booty collected by the soldiers of Timoleon. — Discouragement and terror among the defeated army as well as at Carthage itself. — Great increase of glory to Timoleon — favor of the gods shown to him in the battle. — Timoleon returns to Syracuse — he dismisses Thrasius and the mercenaries who had deserted him — he sends them out of Sicily — their fate. — Success of Timoleon against Hiketas and Mamerkus. — Victory gained by Timoleon over Hiketas, at the river Damurias. — Timoleon attacks Hiketas and Leontini. The place (with Hiketas in person) is surrendered to Timoleon by the garrison. Hiketas and his family are put to death. — Timoleon gains a victory over Mamerkus — he concludes peace with the Carthaginians. — Timoleon conquers and takes prisoners Mamerkus and Hippon. Mamerkus is condemned by the Syracusan public assembly. — Timoleon puts down all the despots in Sicily. — Timoleon lays down his power at Syracuse. — Gratitude and reward to him by the Syracusans. — Great influence of Timoleon, even after he had laid down his power. — Immigration of new Greek settlers into Sicily, to Gela, Agrigentum, Kamarina, etc. — Value and importance of the moral ascendency enjoyed by Timoleon, in regulating these new settlements. — Numerous difficulties which he would be called upon to adjust. — Residence of Timoleon at Syracuse — chapel to the goddess Automatia. — Arrival of the blind Timoleon in the public assembly of Syracuse during matters of grave and critical discussion. — Manner in which Timoleon bore contradiction in the public assembly — his earnest anxiety to ensure freedom of speech against himself. — Uncorrupted moderation and public spirit of Timoleon. — Xenophontic ideal — command over willing free men — qualities, positive as well as negative, of Timoleon. — Freedom and comfort diffused throughout all Sicily for twenty-four years, until the despotism of Agathokles. — Death and obsequies of Timoleon. — Proclamation at his funeral — monument to his honor. — Contrast of Dion and Timoleon. 128-197

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Chapter LXXXVI

CENTRAL GREECE: THE ACCESSION OF PHILIP OF MACEDON TO THE BIRTH OF ALEXANDER. 359-356 B. C.

Central Greece resumed. — State of Central Greece in 360-359 B. C. — Degradation of Sparta. — Megalopolis — Messênê — their fear of Sparta — no central action in Peloponnesus. — Corinth, Sikyon, etc. — Comparatively good condition of Athens. — Power of Thebes. — Extinction of the free cities of Bœotia by the Thebans — repugnant to Grecian feeling. — Thessaly — despots of Pheræ. — Alexander of Pheræ — his cruelties — his assassination. — Tisiphonus despot of Pheræ — loss of power in the Pheræan dynasty. — Macedon — reign and death of Perdikkas. — Philip as a youth at Thebes — ideas there acquired — foundation laid of his future military ability. — Condition of Philip at the death of Perdikkas. — Embarrassments and dangers with which he had to contend. — Macedonian government. — Proceedings of Philip against his numerous enemies. His success — Thracians — Athenians. — He evacuates Amphipolis. He defeats Argæus and the Athenians — his mild treatment of Athenian prisoners. — Philip makes peace with Athens — renounces his claim to Amphipolis. — Victories of Philip over the Pæonians and Illyrians. — Amphipolis evacuated by Philip — the Athenians neglect it. — State of Eubœa — the Thebans foment revolt and attack the island — victorious efforts of Athens. — Surrender of the Chersonese to Athens. — Social War — Chios, Kos, Rhodes, and Byzantium revolt from Athens. — Causes of the Social War — conduct of the Athenians. — Synod at Athens. — Athens acts more for her own separate interests, and less for that of her allies — her armaments on service — badly paid mercenaries — their extortions. — The four cities declare themselves independent of Athens — interference of the Karian Mausôlus. — Great force of the revolters — armament despatched by Athens against Chios — repulse of the Athenians, and death of Chabrias. — Farther armaments of Athens — Iphikrates, Timotheus, and Chares — unsuccessful operations in the Hellespont, and quarrel between the generals. — Iphikrates and Timotheus are accused by Chares at Athens — Iphikrates is acquitted, Timotheus is fined and retires from Athens. — Arrogance and unpopularity of Timotheus, attested by his friend Isokrates. — Exile of Timotheus — his death soon afterwards. — Iphikrates no more employed — great loss to Athens in these two generals. — Expedition of Chares — Athens makes peace with her revolted allies, recognizing their full autonomy. — End of the Social War — great loss of power to Athens. — Renewed action of Philip. He lays siege to Amphipolis. — The Amphipolitans send to ask assistance from Athens — manœuvres of Philip to induce Athens not to interfere. — The Athenians determine not to assist Amphipolis — their motives — importance of this resolution. — Capture of Amphipolis by Philip, through the treason of a party in the town. — Importance of Amphipolis to Philip — disappointment of the Athenians at his breach of promise. — Philip amuses the Athenians with false assurances — he induces them to reject advances from the Olynthians — proposed exchange of Pydna for Amphipolis. — Philip acts in a hostile manner against Athens — he conquers Pydna and Potidæa — gives Potidæa to the Olynthians — remissness of the Athenians. — Increase of the power of Philip — he founds Philippi, opens gold mines near Mount Pangæus, and derives large revenues from them. — Marriage of Philip with Olympias — birth of Alexander the Great. 197-241

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Chapter LXXXVII

FROM THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE SACRED WAR TO THAT OF THE OLYNTHIAN WAR.

Causes of the Sacred War — the Amphiktyonic assembly. — Political complaint brought before the assembly, first by Thebes against Sparta. — Next, by Thebes against the Phokians. The Phokians are condemned and heavily fined. — The assembly pass a vote consecrating the Phokian territory to Apollo. — Resolution of the Phokians to resist — Philomelus their leader. — Question of right raised as to the presidency of the temple — old right of the Phokians against that of the Delphians and the Amphiktyons. — Active measures taken by Philomelus. He goes to Sparta — obtains aid from king Archidamus. He seizes Delphi — defeats the Lokrians. — Philomelus fortifies the temple — levies numerous mercenaries — tries to conciliate Grecian sentiment. The Grecian world divided. — Philomelus tries to retain the prophetic agency — conduct of the Pythia. — Battles of Philomelus against the Lokrians — his success. — Exertions of the Thebans to raise a confederacy against the Phokians. — Danger of the Phokians — they take part of the treasures of the temple, in order to pay a mercenary force. — Numerous mercenaries employed by the Phokians — violence and ferocity of the war — defeat and death of Philomelus. — Onomarchus general of the Phokians — he renews the war — his power by means of the mercenaries. — Violent measures of Onomarchus — he employs the treasures of the temple to scatter bribes through the various cities. — Successes of Onomarchus — he advances as far as Thermopylæ — he invades Bœotia — is repulsed by the Thebans. — The Thebans send a force under Pammenes to assist Artabazus in Asia Minor. — Conquest of Sestos by Chares and the Athenians. — Intrigues of Kersobleptes against Athens — he is compelled to cede to her his portion of the Chersonese — Athenian settlers sent thither, as well as to Samos. — Activity and constant progress of Philip — he conquers Methônê — remissness of Athens. — Philip marches into Thessaly against the despots of Pheræ. — Great power of Onomarchus and the Phokians — plans of Athens and Sparta — the Spartans contemplate hostilities against Megalopolis. — First appearance of Demosthenes as a public adviser in the Athenian assembly. — Parentage and early youth of Demosthenes — wealth of his father — dishonesty of his guardians. — Youth of Demosthenes — sickly and feeble constitution — want of physical education and bodily vigor. — Training of Demosthenes for a speaker — his instructors — Isæus — Plato — his devoted study of Thucydides. — Indefatigable efforts of Demosthenes to surmount his natural defects as a speaker. — Value set by Demosthenes upon action in oratory. His mind and thoughts — how formed. — He becomes first known as a logographer or composer of speeches for litigants. — Phokion — his antithesis and rivalry with Demosthenes — his character and position — his bravery and integrity. — Lasting hold acquired by his integrity on the public of Athens. — Number of times that he was elected general. — His manner of speaking — effective brevity — contempt of oratory. — His frankness — his contempt of the Athenian people — his imperturbability — his repulsive manners. — Phokion and Eubulus the leaders of the peace-party, which represented the strongly predominant sentiment at Athens. — Influence of Phokion mischievous during the reign of Philip — at that time Athens might have prevailed over Macedonia. — Change in the military spirit of Greece since the Peloponnesian war. Decline of the citizen soldiership: increased spread of mercenary troops. Contrast between the Periklean and the Demosthenic citizen. — Decline of military readiness also among the Peloponnesian allies of Sparta. — Multiplication of mercenary soldiers — its mischievous consequences — necessity of providing emigration. — Deterioration of the Grecian military force occurred at the same time with the great development of the Macedonian force. — Rudeness and poverty of the Macedonians — excellent material for soldiers — organizing genius of Philip. — First parliamentary harangue of Demosthenes — on the Symmories — alarm felt about Persia. — Positive recommendations in the speech — mature thought and sagacity which they imply. — His proposed preparation and scheme for extending the basis of the Symmories. — Spirit of the Demosthenic exhortations — always impressing the necessity of personal effort and sacrifice as conditions of success. — Affairs of Peloponnesus — projects of Sparta against Megalopolis — her attempt to obtain coöperation from Athens. — Views and recommendations of Demosthenes — he advises that Athens shall uphold Messênê and Megalopolis. — Philip in Thessaly — he attacks Lykophron of Pheræ, who calls in Onomarchus and the Phokians — Onomarchus defeats Philip. — Successes of Onomarchus in Bœotia — maximum of the Phokian power. — Philip repairs his forces and marches again into Thessaly — his complete victory over the Phokians — Onomarchus is slain. — Philip conquers Pheræ and Pagasæ — becomes master of all Thessaly — expulsion of Lykophron. — Philip invades Thermopylæ — the Athenians send a force thither and arrest his progress. Their alarm at this juncture, and unusual rapidity of movement. — Phayllus takes the command of the Phokians — third spoliation of the temple — revived strength of the Phokians — malversation of the leaders. — War in Peloponnesus — the Spartans attack Megalopolis — interference of Thebes. — Hostilities with indecisive result — peace concluded — autonomy of Megalopolis again recognized. — Ill success of the Phokians in Bœotia — death of Phayllus, who is succeeded by Phalækus. — The Thebans obtain money from the Persian king. — Increased power and formidable attitude of Philip. Alarm which he now begins to inspire throughout the Grecian world. — Philip acquires a considerable navy — importance of the Gulf of Pagasæ to him — his flying squadrons annoy the Athenian commerce and coast. — Philip carries on war in Thrace — his intrigues among the Thracian princes. — He besieges Heræon Teichos: alarm at Athens: a decree is passed to send out a fleet: Philip falls sick: the fleet is not sent. — Popularity of the mercenary general Charidemus — vote in his favor proposed by Aristokrates — speech composed by Demosthenes against it. — Languor of the Athenians — the principal peace-leaders, Eubulus, Phokion, etc., propose nothing energetic against Philip — Demosthenes undertakes the duty. — First Philippic of Demosthenes, 352-351 B. C. — remarks and recommendations of the first Philippic. Severe comments on the past apathy of the people. — He insists on the necessity that citizens shall serve in person, and proposes the formation of an acting fleet and armament. — His financial propositions. — Mischiefs of the past negligence and want of preparation — harm done by the mercenary unpaid armaments, serving without citizens. — Characteristics of the first Philippic — prudent advice and early warnings of Demosthenes. — Advice of Demosthenes not carried into effect: no serious measures adopted by Athens. — Opponents of Demosthenes at Athens — speakers in the pay of Philip — alarm about the Persian king still continues. 241-319

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LXXXVIII. EUBOIC AND OLYNTHIAN WARS

Change of sentiments at Olynthus — the Olynthians afraid of Philip — they make peace with Athens. — Unfriendly feelings of Philip towards Olynthus — ripening into war in 350 B. C. — Fugitive half-brothers of Philip obtain shelter at Olynthus. — Intrigues of Philip in Olynthus — his means of corruption and of fomenting intestine discord. — Conquest and destruction of the Olynthian confederate towns by Philip, between 350-347 B. C. terrible phenomena. — Philip attacks the Olynthians and Chalkidians — beginning of the Olynthian war, 350 B. C. — The Olynthians conclude alliance with Athens. — The Athenians contract alliance with Olynthus — earliest Olynthiac speech of Demosthenes. — The Second Olynthiac is the earliest — its tone and tenor. — Disposition to magnify the practical effect of the speeches of Demosthenes — his true position — he is an opposition speaker. — Philip continues to press the Olynthian confederacy — increasing danger of Olynthus — fresh applications to Athens. — Demosthenes delivers another Olynthiac oration — that which stands First, in the printed order. Its tenor. — Just appreciation of the situation by Demosthenes. He approaches the question of the Theôric Fund. — Assistance sent by Athens to Olynthus. Partial success against Philip. — Partial and exaggerated confidence at Athens. The Athenians lose sight of the danger of Olynthus. Third Olynthiac of Demosthenes. — Tenor and substance of the third Olynthiac. — Courage of Demosthenes in combating the prevalent sentiment. — Revolt of Eubœa from Athens. — Intrigues of Philip in Eubœa. — Plutarch of Eretria asks aid from Athens. Aid is sent to him under Phokion, though Demosthenes dissuades it — Treachery of Plutarch — danger of Phokion and the Athenians in Eubœa — victory of Phokion at Tamynæ. — Dionysiac festival at Athens in March, 349 B. C. — Insult offered to Demosthenes by Meidias. — Reproaches against Demosthenes for having been absent from the battle of Tamynæ — he goes over on service to Eubœa as a hoplite — he is named senator for 349-348 B. C. — Hostilities in Eubœa, during 349-348 B. C. — Great efforts of Athens in 349 B. C. for the support of Olynthus and the maintenance of Eubœa at the same time. — Financial embarrassments of Athens. Motion of Apollodorus about the Theôric Fund. The assembly appropriate the surplus of revenue to military purposes. — Apollodorus is indicted and fined. — The diversion of the Theôric Fund proves the great anxiety of the moment at Athens. — Three expeditions sent by Athens to Chalkidikê in 349-348 B. C. according to Philochorus. — Final success of Philip — capture of the Chalkidic towns and of Olynthus. — Sale of the Olynthian prisoners — ruin of the Greek cities in Chalkidikê. — Cost incurred by Athens in the Olynthian war. — Theôric Fund — not appropriated to war purposes until a little before the battle of Chæroneia. — Views respecting the Theôric Fund. — It was the general Fund of Athens for religious festivals and worship — distributions were one part of it — character of the ancient religious festivals. — No other branch of the Athenian peace-establishment was impoverished or sacrificed to the Theôric expenditure. — The annual surplus might have been accumulated as a war-fund — how far Athens is blamable for not having done so. — Attempt of the Athenian property-classes to get clear of direct taxation by taking from the Theôric Fund. — Conflict of these two feelings at Athens. Demosthenes tries to mediate between them — calls for sacrifices from all, especially personal military service. — Appendix. 319-363

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Chapter LXXXIX

FROM THE CAPTURE OF OLYNTHUS TO THE TERMINATION OF THE SACRED WAR BY PHILIP.

Sufferings of the Olynthians and Chalkidians — triumph and festival of Philip. — Effect produced at Athens by the capture of Olynthus — especially by the number of Athenian captives taken in it. — Energetic language of Eubulus and Æschines against Philip. — Increased importance of Æschines. — Æschines as envoy of Athens in Arcadia. — Increasing despondency and desire for peace at Athens. — Indirect overtures for peace between Athens and Philip, even before the fall of Olynthus — the Eubœans — Phrynon, etc. — First proposition of Philokrates — granting permission to Philip to send envoys to Athens. — Effect produced upon the minds of the Athenians by their numerous captive citizens taken by Philip at Olynthus. — Mission of the actor Aristodemus from the Athenians to Philip on the subject of the captives. Favorable dispositions reported from Philip. — Course of the Sacred War — gradual decline and impoverishment of the Phokians. Dissensions among themselves. — Party opposed to Phalækus in Phokis — Phalækus is deposed — he continues to hold Thermopylæ with the mercenaries. — The Thebans invoke the aid of Philip to put down the Phokians. — Alarm among the Phokians — one of the Phokian parties invites the Athenians to occupy Thermopylæ — Phalækus repels them. — Increased embarrassment at Athens — uncertainty about Phalækus and the pass of Thermopylæ. — The defence of Greece now turned on Thermopylæ — importance of that pass both to Philip and to Athens. — Motion of Philokrates in the Athenian assembly — to send envoys to Philip for peace. — Ten Athenian envoys sent — Demosthenes and Æschines among them. — Journey of the envoys to Pella. — Statements of Æschines about the conduct of Demosthenes — arrangements of the envoys for speaking before Philip. — Harangue addressed by Æschines to Philip about Amphipolis. Failure of Demosthenes in his speech. — Answer of Philip — return of the envoys. — Review of Æschines and his conduct, as stated by himself. — Philip offers peace on the terms of uti possidetis — report made by the Athenian envoys on their return. — Proceedings in the Athenian assembly after the return of the envoys — motions of Demosthenes. — Arrival of the Macedonian envoys at Athens — days fixed for discussing the peace. — Resolution taken by the synod of allies at Athens. — Assemblies held to discuss the peace, in presence of the Macedonian envoys. — Philokrates moves to conclude peace and alliance with Philip. He proposes to exclude the Phokians specially. — Part taken by Æschines and Demosthenes — in reference to this motion. Contradictions between them. — Æschines supported the motion of Philokrates altogether — Demosthenes supported it also, except as to the exclusion of the Phokians — language of Eubulus. — Motion of Philokrates carried in the assembly, for peace and alliance with Philip. — Assembly to provide ratification and swearing of the treaty. — Question, Who were to be received as allies of Athens? — about the Phokians and Kersobleptes. — The envoy of Kersobleptes is admitted, both by the Athenian assembly and by the Macedonian envoys. — The Macedonian envoys formally refuse to admit the Phokians. — Difficulty of Philokrates and Æschines. Their false assurances about the secret good intentions of Philip towards the Phokians. — The Phokians are tacitly excluded — the Athenians and their allies swear to the peace without them. — Ruinous mistake — false step of Athens in abandoning the Phokians — Demosthenes did not protest against it at the time. — The oaths are taken before Antipater, leaving out the Phokians. — Second embassy from Athens to Philip. — Demosthenes urges the envoys to go immediately to Thrace in order to administer the oath to Philip — they refuse — their delay on the journey and at Pella. — Philip completes his conquest of Thrace during the interval. — Embassies from many Grecian states at Pella. — Consultations and dissensions among the Ten Athenian envoys — views taken by Æschines of the ambassadorial duties. — The envoys address Philip — harangue of Æschines. — Position of Demosthenes in this second embassy. — March of Philip to Thermopylæ — he masks his purposes, holding out delusive hopes to the Phokians. Intrigues to gain his favor. — The envoys administer the oaths to Philip at Pheræ, the last thing before their departure. They return to Athens. — Plans of Philip on Thermopylæ — corrupt connivance of the Athenian envoys — letter from Philip which they brought back to Athens. — Æschines and the envoys proclaim the Phokians to be excluded from the oaths with Philip — protest of Demosthenes in the Senate, on arriving at Athens, against the behavior of his colleagues — vote of the Senate approving his protest. — Public assembly at Athens — successful address made to it by Æschines — his false assurances to the people. — The Athenian people believe the promises of Philokrates and Æschines — protest of Demosthenes not listened to. — Letter of Philip favorably received by the assembly — motion of Philokrates carried, decreeing peace and alliance with him forever. Resolution to compel the Phokians to give up Delphi. — Letters of Philip to the Athenians, inviting them to send forces to join him at Thermopylæ — policy of these letters — the Athenians do nothing. — Phokian envoys heard these debates at Athens — position of Phalækus at Thermopylæ. — Dependence of the Phokians upon Athenian aid to hold Thermopylæ. — News received at Thermopylæ of the determination of Athens against the Phokians. — Phalækus surrenders Thermopylæ under convention to Philip. He withdraws all his forces. — All the towns in Phokis surrender at discretion to Philip, who declares his full concurrence with the Thebans. — Third embassy sent by the Athenians to Philip — the envoys return without seeing him, on hearing of the Phokian convention. — Alarm and displeasure at Athens — motion of Kallisthenes for putting the city in a good state of defence — Æschines and other Athenian envoys visit Philip in Phokis — triumphant celebration of Philip’s success. — Fair professions of Philip to the Athenians, after his conquest of Thermopylæ: language of his partisans at Athens. — The Amphiktyonic assembly is convoked anew. Rigorous sentence against the Phokians. They are excluded from the assembly, and Philip is admitted in their place. — Ruin and wretchedness of the Phokians. — Irresistible ascendency of Philip. He is named by the Amphiktyons presiding celebrator of the Pythian festival of 346 B. C. — Great change effected by this peace in Grecian political relations. Demosthenes and Æschines — proof of dishonesty and fraud in Æschines, even from his own admissions. — This disgraceful peace was brought upon Athens by the corruption of her own envoys. — Impeachment and condemnation of Philokrates. — Miserable death of all concerned in the spoliation of the Delphian temple. 364-434

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Chapter XC

FROM THE PEACE OF 346 B. C. TO THE BATTLE OF CHÆRONEIA AND THE DEATH OF PHILIP.

Position of Philip after the conclusion of the Sacred War. — Sentiments of Demosthenes — he recommends acquiescence in the peace, and recognition of the new Amphiktyonic dignity of Philip. — Sentiments of Isokrates — his letter to Philip — his abnegation of free Hellenism. — Position of the Persian king Ochus — his measures against revolters in Phenicia and Egypt. — Reconquest of Phenicia by Ochus — perfidy of the Sidonian prince Tennes. — Reconquest of Egypt by the Persian force under Mentor and Bagoas. — Power of Mentor as Persian viceroy of the Asiatic coast — he seizes Hermeias of Atarneus. — Peace between Philip and the Athenians, continued without formal renunciation from 346-340 B. C. — Movements and intrigues of Philip everywhere throughout Greece. — Disunion of the Grecian world — no Grecian city recognized as leader. — Vigilance and renewed warnings of Demosthenes against Philip. — Mission of Python to Athens by Philip — amendments proposed in the recent peace — fruitless discussions upon them. — Dispute about Halonnesus. — The Athenians refuse to accept cession of Halonnesus as a favor, claiming restitution of it as their right. — Halonnesus taken and retaken — reprisals between Philip and the Athenians. — Movements of the philippizing factions at Megara — at Oreus — at Eretria. — Philip in Thrace — disputes about the Bosphorus and Hellespont — Diopeithes commander for Athens in the Chersonese. Philip takes part with the Kardians against Athens. Hostile collisions and complaints against Diopeithes. — Accusations against Diopeithes at Athens by the philippizing orators — Demosthenes defends him — speech on the Chersonese, and third Philippic. — Increased influence of Demosthenes at Athens — Athenian expedition sent, upon his motion, to Eubœa — Oreus and Eretria are liberated, and Eubœa is detached from Philip. — Mission of Demosthenes to the Chersonese and Byzantium — his important services in detaching the Byzantines from Philip, and bringing them into alliance with Athens. — Philip commences the siege of Perinthus — he marches through the Chersonesus — declaration of war by Athens against him. — Manifesto of Philip, declaring war against Athens — Complaints of Philip against the Athenians — his policy towards Athens — his lecture on the advantages of peace. — Open war between Philip and the Athenians. — Siege of Perinthus by Philip. His numerous engines for siege — great scale of operations. Obstinacy of the defence. The town is relieved by the Byzantines, and by Grecian mercenaries from the Persian satraps. — Philip attacks Byzantium — danger of the place — it is relieved by the fleets of Athens, Chios, Rhodes, etc. Success of the Athenian fleet in the Propontis under Phokion. Philip abandons the sieges both of Perinthus and Byzantium. — Votes of thanks from Byzantium and the Chersonesus to Athens for her aid — honors and compliments to Demosthenes. — Philip withdraws from Byzantium, concludes peace with the Byzantines, Chians, and others, and attacks the Scythians. He is defeated by the Triballi, and wounded, on his return. — Important reform effected by Demosthenes in the administration of the Athenian marine. — Abuses which had crept into the trierarchy — unfair apportionment of the burthen — undue exemption which the rich administrators had acquired for themselves. — Individual hardship, and bad public consequences, occasioned by these inequalities. — Opposition offered by the rich citizens and by Æschines to the proposed reform of Demosthenes — difficulties which he had to overcome. — His new reform distributes the burthen of trierarchy equitably. — Its complete success. Improved efficiency of the naval armaments under it. — New Sacred War commences in Greece. — Kirrha and its plain near Delphi consecrated to Apollo, in the first Sacred War under Solon. — Necessity of a port at Kirrha, for the convenience of visitors to Delphi. Kirrha grows up again, and comes into the occupation of the Lokrians of Amphissa. — Relations between the Lokrians of Amphissa and Delphi — they had stood forward earnestly in the former Sacred War to defend Delphi against the Phokians. — Amphiktyonic meeting at Delphi — February, 339 B. C. Æschines one of the legates from Athens. — Language of an Amphissian speaker among the Amphiktyons against Athens — new dedication of an old Athenian donative in the temple. — Speech of Æschines in the Amphiktyonic assembly. — Passion and tumult excited by his speech. — Violent resolution adopted by the Amphiktyons. — The Amphiktyons with the Delphian multitude march down to destroy Kirrha — interference of the Amphissians to rescue their property. They drive off the Amphiktyons. — Farther resolution taken by the Amphiktyons to hold a future special meeting and take measures for punishing the Lokrians. — Unjust violence of the Amphiktyons — public mischief done by Æschines. — Effect of the proceeding of Æschines at Athens. Opposition of Demosthenes at first fruitless. — Change of feeling at Athens — the Athenians resolve to take no part in the Amphiktyonic proceedings against Amphissa. — Special meeting of the Amphiktyons at Thermopylæ, held without Athens. Vote passed to levy a force for punishing Amphissa. Kottyphus president. The Amphiktyons invoke the intervention of Philip. — Motives which dictated the vote — dependence of most of the Amphiktyonic voters upon Philip — Philip accepts the command — marches southward through Thermopylæ. — Philip enters Phokis. — He suddenly occupies, and begins to re-fortify Elateia. — He sends an embassy to Thebes, announcing his intention to attack Attica, and asking either aid, or a free passage for his own army. — Unfriendly relations subsisting between Athens and Thebes. Hopes of Philip that Thebes would act in concert with him against Athens. — Great alarm at Athens, when the news arrived that Philip was fortifying Elateia. — Athenian public assembly held — general anxiety and silence — no one will speak but Demosthenes. — Advice of Demosthenes to despatch an embassy immediately to Thebes, and to offer alliance on the most liberal terms. — The advice of Demosthenes is adopted — he is despatched with other envoys to Thebes. — Divided state of feeling at Thebes — influence of the philippizing party — effect produced by the Macedonian envoys. — Efficient and successful oratory of Demosthenes — he persuades the Thebans to contract alliance with Athens against Philip. — The Athenian army marches by invitation to Thebes — cordial coöperation of the Thebans and Athenians. — Vigorous resolutions taken at Athens — continuance of the new docks suspended — the Theôric Fund is devoted to military purposes. — Disappointment of Philip — he remains in Phokis, and writes to his Peloponnesian allies to come and join him against Amphissa. — War of the Athenians and Thebans against Philip in Phokis — they gain some advantages over him — honors paid to Demosthenes at Athens. — The Athenians and Thebans reconstitute the Phokians and their towns. — War against Philip in Phokis — great influence of Demosthenes — auxiliaries which he procured. — Increased efforts of Philip in Phokis. — Successes of Philip — he defeats a large body of mercenary troops — he takes Amphissa. — No eminent general on the side of the Greeks — Demosthenes keeps up the spirits of the allies, and holds them together. — Battle of Chæroneia — complete victory of Philip. — Macedonian phalanx — its long pikes — superior in front charge to the Grecian hoplites. — Excellent organization of the Macedonian army by Philip — different sorts of force combined. — loss at the battle of Chæroneia. — Distress and alarm at Athens on the news of the defeat. — Resolutions taken at Athens for energetic defence. Respect and confidence shown to Demosthenes. — Effect produced upon some of the islanders in the Ægean by the defeat — conduct of the Rhodians. — Conduct of Philip after the victory — harshness towards Thebes — greater lenity to Athens. — Conduct of Æschines — Demades is sent as envoy to Philip. — Peace of Demades, concluded between Philip and the Athenians. The Athenians are compelled to recognize him as chief of the Hellenic world. — Remarks of Polybius on the Demadean peace — means of resistance still possessed by Athens. — Honorary votes passed at Athens to Philip. — Impeachment brought against Demosthenes at Athens — the Athenians stand by him. — Expedition of Philip into Peloponnesus. He invades Laconia. — Congress held at Corinth. Philip is chosen chief of the Greeks against Persia. — Mortification to Athenian feelings — degraded position of Athens and of Greece. No genuine feeling in Greece now, towards war against Persia. — Preparations of Philip for the invasion of Persia. — Philip repudiates Olympias at the instance of his recently married wife, Kleopatra — resentment of Olympias and Alexander — dissension at Court. — Great festival in Macedonia — celebrating the birth of a son to Philip by Kleopatra, and the marriage of his daughter with Alexander of Epirus. — Pausanias — outrage inflicted upon him — his resentment against Philip, encouraged by the partisans of Olympias and Alexander. — Assassination of Philip by Pausanias, who is slain by the guards. — Accomplices of Pausanias. — Alexander the great is declared king — first notice given to him by the Lynkestian Alexander, one of the conspirators — Attalus and queen Kleopatra, with her infant son, are put to death. — Satisfaction manifested by Olympias at the death of Philip. — Character of Philip. 434-523

HISTORY OF GREECE.

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Chapter LXXXIII

SICILIAN AFFAIRS (continued). — FROM THE DESTRUCTION OF THE CARTHAGINIAN ARMY BY PESTILENCE BEFORE SYRACUSE, DOWN TO THE DEATH OF DIONYSIUS THE ELDER. B. C. 394-367.

In my preceding volume, I have described the first eleven years of the reign of Dionysius called the Elder, as despot at Syracuse, down to his first great war against the Carthaginians; which war ended by a sudden turn of fortune in his favor, at a time when he was hard pressed and actually besieged. The victorious Carthaginian army before Syracuse was utterly ruined by a terrible pestilence, followed by ignominious treason on the part of its commander Imilkon.

Within the space of less than thirty years, we read of four distinct epidemic distempers,[1] each of frightful severity, as having afflicted Carthage and her armies in Sicily, without touching either Syracuse or the Sicilian Greeks. Such epidemics were the most irresistible of all enemies to the Carthaginians, and the most effective allies to Dionysius. The second and third,—conspicuous among the many fortunate events of his life,—occurred at the exact juncture necessary for rescuing him from a tide of superiority in the Carthaginian arms, which seemed in a fair way to overwhelm him completely. Upon what physical conditions the frequent repetition of such a calamity depended, together with the remarkable fact that it was confined to Carthage and her armies,—we know partially in respect to the third of the four cases, but not at all in regard to the others.

[1] Diodor. xiii. 86-114; xiv. 70; xv. 24. Another pestilence is alluded to by Diodorus in 368 B. C. (Diodor. xv. 73).

Movers notices the intense and frequent sufferings of the ancient Phœnicians, in their own country, from pestilence; and the fearful expiations to which these sufferings gave rise (Die Phönizier, vol. ii. part ii. p. 9).

The flight of Imilkon with his Carthaginians from Syracuse left Dionysius and the Syracusans in the full swing of triumph. The conquests made by Imilkon were altogether lost, and the Carthaginian dominion in Sicily was now cut down to that restricted space in the western corner of the island, which it had occupied prior to the invasion of Hannibal in 409 B. C. So prodigious a success probably enabled Dionysius to put down the opposition recently manifested among the Syracusans to the continuance of his rule. We are told that he was greatly embarrassed by his mercenaries; who, having been for some time without pay, manifested such angry discontent as to threaten his downfall. Dionysius seized the person of their commander, the Spartan Aristoteles: upon which the soldiers mutined and flocked in arms around his residence, demanding in fierce terms both the liberty of their commander and the payment of their arrears. Of these demands, Dionysius eluded the first by saying that he would send away Aristoteles to Sparta, to be tried and dealt with among his own countrymen: as to the second, he pacified the soldiers by assigning to them, in exchange for their pay, the town and territory of Leontini. Willingly accepting this rich bribe, the most fertile soil of the island, the mercenaries quitted Syracuse to the number of ten thousand, to take up their residence in the newly assigned town; while Dionysius hired new mercenaries in their place. To these (including perhaps the Iberians or Spaniards who had recently passed from the Carthaginian service into his) and to the slaves whom he had liberated, he intrusted the maintenance of his dominion.[2]

[2] Diodor. xiv. 78.

These few facts, which are all that we hear, enable us to see that the relations between Dionysius and the mercenaries by whose means he ruled Syracuse, were troubled and difficult to manage. But they do not explain to us the full cause of such discord. We know that a short time before, Dionysius had rid himself of one thousand obnoxious mercenaries by treacherously betraying them to death in a battle with the Carthaginians. Moreover, he would hardly have seized the person of Aristoteles, and sent him away for trial, if the latter had done nothing more than demand pay really due to his soldiers. It seems probable that the discontent of the mercenaries rested upon deeper causes, perhaps connected with that movement in the Syracusan mind against Dionysius, manifested openly in the invective of Theodorus. We should have been glad also to know how Dionysius proposed to pay the new mercenaries, if he had no means of paying the old. The cost of maintaining his standing army, upon whomsoever it fell, must have been burdensome in the extreme. What became of the previous residents and proprietors at Leontini, who must have been dispossessed when this much-coveted site was transferred to the mercenaries? On all these points we are unfortunately left in ignorance.

Dionysius now set forth towards the north of Sicily to reëstablish Messênê; while those other Sicilians, who had been expelled from their abodes by the Carthaginians, got together and returned. In reconstituting Messênê after its demolition by Imilkon, he obtained the means of planting there a population altogether in his interests, suitable to the aggressive designs which he was already contemplating against Rhegium and the other Italian Greeks. He established in it one thousand Lokrians,—four thousand persons from another city the name of which we cannot certainly make out,[3]—and six hundred of the Peloponnesian Messenians. These latter had been expelled by Sparta from Zakynthus and Naupaktus at the close of the Peloponnesian war, and had taken service in Sicily with Dionysius. Even here, the hatred of Sparta followed them. Her remonstrances against his project of establishing them in a city of consideration bearing their own ancient name, obliged him to withdraw them: upon which he planted them on a portion of the Abakene territory on the northern coast. They gave to their new city the name of Tyndaris, admitted many new residents, and conducted their affairs so prudently, as presently to attain a total of five thousand citizens.[4] Neither here, nor at Messênê, do we find any mention made of the reëstablishment of those inhabitants who had fled when Imilkon took Messênê, and who formed nearly all the previous population of the city, for very few are mentioned as having been slain. It seems doubtful whether Dionysius readmitted them, when he reconstituted Messênê. Renewing with care the fortifications of the city, which had been demolished by Imilkon, he placed in it some of his mercenaries as garrison.[5]

[3] Diodor. xiv. 78. Διονύσιος δ᾽ εἰς Μεσσήνην κατῴκισε χιλίους μὲν Λοκροὺς, τετρακισχιλίους δὲ ~Μεδιμναίους~, ἑξακοσίους δὲ τῶν ἐκ Πελοποννήσου Μεσσηνίων, ἔκ τε Ζακύνθου καὶ Ναυπάκτου φευγόντων.

The Medimnæans are completely unknown. Cluverius and Wesseling conjecture Medmæans, from Medmæ or Medamæ, noticed by Strabo as a town in the south of Italy. But this supposition cannot be adopted as certain; especially as the total of persons named is so large. The conjecture of Palmerius—Μηθυμναίους—has still less to recommend it. See the note of Wesseling.

[4] Diodor. xiv. 78.

[5] Diodor. xiv. 87.

Dionysius next undertook several expeditions against the Sikels in the interior of the island, who had joined Imilkon in his recent attack upon Syracuse. He conquered several of their towns, and established alliances with two of their most powerful princes, at Agyrium and Kentoripæ. Enna and Kephalœdium were also betrayed to him, as well as the Carthaginian dependency of Solûs. By these proceedings, which appear to have occupied some time, he acquired powerful ascendency in the central and north-east parts of the island, while his garrison at Messênê; ensured to him the command of the strait between Sicily and Italy.[6]

[6] Diodor. xiv. 78. εἰς τὴν τῶν Σικελῶν χώραν πλεονάκις στρατεύσας, etc. Wesseling shows in his note, that these words, and those which follow must refer to Dionysius.

His acquisition of this important fortified position was well understood to imply ulterior designs against Rhegium and the other Grecian cities in the south of Italy, among whom accordingly a lively alarm prevailed. The numerous exiles whom he had expelled, not merely from Syracuse, but also from Naxus, Katana, and the other conquered towns, having no longer any assured shelter in Sicily, had been forced to cross over into Italy, where they were favorably received both at Kroton and at Rhegium.[7] One of these exiles, Helôris, once the intimate friend of Dionysius, was even appointed general of the forces of Rhegium; forces at that time not only powerful on land, but sustained by a fleet of seventy or eighty triremes.[8] Under his command, a Rhegine force crossed the strait for the purpose partly of besieging Messênê, partly of establishing the Naxian and Katanean exiles at Mylæ on the northern coast of the island, not far from Messênê. Neither scheme succeeded: Helôris was repulsed from Messênê with loss, while the new settlers at Mylæ were speedily expelled. The command of the strait was thus fully maintained to Dionysius; who, on the point of undertaking an aggressive expedition over to Italy, was delayed only by the necessity of capturing the newly established Sikel town on the hill of Taurus—or Tauromenium. The Sikels defended this position, in itself high and strong, with unexpected valor and obstinacy. It was the spot on which the primitive Grecian colonists who first came to Sicily, had originally landed, and from whence, therefore, the successive Hellenic encroachments upon the pre-established Sikel population, had taken their commencement. This fact, well known to both parties, rendered the capture on one side as much a point of honor, as the preservation on the other. Dionysius spent months in the siege, even throughout midwinter, while the snow covered this hill-top. He made reiterated assaults, which were always repulsed. At last, on one moonless winter night, he found means to scramble over some almost inaccessible crags to a portion of the town less defended, and to effect a lodgment in one of the two fortified portions into which it was divided. Having taken the first part, he immediately proceeded to attack the second. But the Sikels, resisting with desperate valor, repulsed him, and compelled the storming party to flee in disorder, amidst the darkness of night, and over the most difficult ground. Six hundred of them were slain on the spot, and scarcely any escaped without throwing away their arms. Even Dionysius himself, being overthrown by the thrust of a spear on his cuirass, was with difficulty picked up and carried off alive; all his arms, except the cuirass, being left behind. He was obliged to raise the siege, and was long in recovering from his wound: the rather as his eyes also had suffered considerably from the snow.[9]

[7] Diodor. xiv. 87-103.

[8] Diodor. xiv. 8, 87, 106

[9] Diodor. xiv. 88.

So manifest a reverse, before a town comparatively insignificant, lowered his military reputation, and encouraged his enemies throughout the island. The Agrigentines and others, throwing off their dependence upon him, proclaimed themselves autonomous; banishing those leaders among them who upheld his interest.[10] Many of the Sikels also, elate with the success of their countrymen at Tauromenium, declared openly against him; joining the Carthaginian general Magon, who now, for the first time since the disaster before Syracuse, again exhibited the force of Carthage in the field.

[10] Diodor. xiv. 88. μετὰ δὲ τὴν ἀτυχίαν ταύτην, Ἀκραγαντῖνοι ~καὶ Μεσσνήνιοι~ τοὺς τὰ Διονυσίου φρονοῦντας μεταστησάμενοι, τῆς ἐλευθερίας ἀντείχοντο, καὶ τῆς τοῦ τυράννου συμμαχίας ἀπέστησαν.

It appears to me that the words καὶ Μεσσνήνιοι in this sentence cannot be correct. The Messenians were a new population just established by Dionysius, and relying upon him for protection against Rhegium: moreover they will appear, during the events immediately succeeding, constantly in conjunction with him, and objects of attack by his enemies.

I cannot but think that Diodorus has here inadvertently placed the word Μεσσνήνιοι instead of a name belonging to some other community—what community, we cannot tell.

Since the disaster before Syracuse, Magon had remained tranquil in the western or Carthaginian corner of the island, recruiting the strength and courage of his countrymen, and taking unusual pains to conciliate the attachment of the dependent native towns. Reinforced in part by the exiles expelled by Dionysius, he was now in a condition to assume the aggressive, and to espouse the cause of the Sikels after their successful defence of Tauromenium. He even ventured to overrun and ravage the Messenian territory; but Dionysius, being now recovered from his wound, marched against him, defeated him in a battle near Abakæna, and forced him again to retire westward, until fresh troops were sent to him from Carthage.[11]

[11] Diodor. xiv. 90-95.

Without pursuing Magon, Dionysius returned to Syracuse, from whence he presently set forth to execute his projects against Rhegium, with a fleet of one hundred ships of war. So skilfully did he arrange or mask his movements, that he arrived at night at the gates and under the walls of Rhegium, without the least suspicion on the part of the citizens. Applying combustibles to set fire to the gate (as he had once done successfully at the gate of Achradina),[12] he at the same time planted his ladders against the walls, and attempted an escalade. Surprised and in small numbers, the citizens began their defence; but the attack was making progress, had not the general Helôris, instead of trying to extinguish the flames, bethought himself of encouraging them by heaping on dry faggots and other matters. The conflagration became so violent, that even the assailants themselves were kept off until time was given for the citizens to mount the walls in force; and the city was saved from capture by burning a portion of it. Disappointed in his hopes, Dionysius was obliged to content himself with ravaging the neighboring territory; after which, he concluded a truce of one year with the Rhegines, and then returned to Syracuse.[13]

[12] Diodor. xiii. 113.

[13] Diodor xiv. 90.

This step was probably determined by news of the movements of Magon, who was in the field anew with a mercenary force reckoned at eighty thousand men—Libyan, Sardinian, and Italian—obtained from Carthage, where hope of Sicilian success was again reviving. Magon directed his march through the Sikel population in the centre of the island, receiving the adhesion of many of their various townships. Agyrium, however, the largest and most important of all, resisted him as an enemy. Agyris, the despot of the place, who had conquered much of the neighboring territory, and had enriched himself by the murder of several opulent proprietors, maintained strict alliance with Dionysius. The latter speedily came to his aid, with a force stated at twenty thousand men, Syracusans and mercenaries. Admitted into the city, and co-operating with Agyris, who furnished abundant supplies, he soon reduced the Carthaginians to great straits. Magon was encamped near the river Chrysas, between Agyrium and Morgantinê; in an enemy’s country, harassed by natives who perfectly knew the ground, and who cut off in detail all his parties sent out to obtain provisions. The Syracusans, indeed, disliking or mistrusting such tardy methods, impatiently demanded leave to make a vigorous attack; and when Dionysius refused, affirming that with a little patience the enemy must be speedily starved out, they left the camp and returned home. Alarmed at their desertion, he forthwith issued a requisition for a large number of slaves to supply their places. But at this very juncture, there arrived a proposition from the Carthaginians to be allowed to make peace and retire; which Dionysius granted, on condition that they should abandon to him the Sikels and their territory—especially Tauromenium. Upon these terms peace was accordingly concluded, and Magon again returned to Carthage.[14]

[14] Diodor. xiv. 95, 96.

Relieved from these enemies, Dionysius was enabled to restore those slaves, whom he had levied under the recent requisition, to their masters. Having established his dominion fully among the Sikels, he again marched against Tauromenium, which on this occasion was unable to resist him. The Sikels, who had so valiantly defended it, were driven out, to make room for new inhabitants, chosen from among the mercenaries of Dionysius.[15]

[15] Diodor. xiv. 96.

Thus master both of Messênê and Tauromenium, the two most important maritime posts on the Italian side of Sicily, Dionysius prepared to execute his ulterior schemes against the Greeks in the south of Italy. These still powerful, though once far more powerful, cities, were now suffering under a cause of decline common to all the Hellenic colonies on the coast of the continent. The indigenous population of the interior had been reinforced, or enslaved, by more warlike emigrants from behind, who now pressed upon the maritime Grecian cities with encroachment difficult to resist.

It was the Samnites, a branch of the hardy Sabellian race, mountaineers from the central portion of the Apennine range, who had been recently spreading themselves abroad as formidable assailants. About 420 B. C., they had established themselves in Capua and the fertile plains of Campania, expelling or dispossessing the previous Tuscan proprietors. From thence, about 416 B. C., they reduced the neighboring city of Cumæ, the most ancient western colony of the Hellenic race.[16] The neighboring Grecian establishments of Neapolis and Dikæarchia seem also to have come, like Cumæ, under tribute and dominion to the Campanian Samnites, and thus became partially dis-hellenised.[17] These Campanians, of Samnite race, have been frequently mentioned in the two preceding chapters, as employed on mercenary service both in the armies of the Carthaginians, and in those of Dionysius.[18] But the great migration of this warlike race was farther to the south-east, down the line of the Apennines towards the Tarentine Gulf and the Sicilian strait. Under the name of Lucanians, they established a formidable power in these regions, subjugating the Œnotrian population there settled.[19] The Lucanian power seems to have begun and to have gradually increased from about 430 B. C. At its maximum (about 380-360 B. C.), it comprehended most part of the inland territory, and considerable portions of the coast, especially the southern coast,—bounded by an imaginary line drawn from Metapontum on the Tarentine Gulf, across the breadth of Italy to Poseidonia or Pæstum, near the mouth of the river Silaris, on the Tyrrhenian or Lower sea. It was about 356 B. C., that the rural serfs, called Bruttians,[20] rebelled against the Lucanians, and robbed them of the southern part of this territory; establishing an independent dominion in the inland portion of what is now called the Farther Calabria—extending from a boundary line drawn across Italy between Thurii and Läus, down to near the Sicilian strait. About 332 B. C., commenced the occasional intervention of the Epirotic kings from the one side, and the persevering efforts of Rome from the other, which, after long and valiant struggles, left Samnites, Lucanians, Bruttians, all Roman subjects.

[16] Livy, iv. 37-44; Strabo, v. p. 243-250. Diodorus (xii. 31-76) places the commencement of the Campanian nation in 438 B. C., and their conquest of Cumæ in 421 B. C. Skylax in his Periplus mentions both Cumæ and Neapolis as in Campania (s. 10.) Thucydides speaks of Cumæ as being ἐν Ὀπικίᾳ (vi. 4).

[17] Strabo, v. p. 246.

[18] Thucydides (vii. 53-57) does not mention Campanians (he mentions Tyrrhenians) as serving in the besieging Athenian armament before Syracuse (414-413 B. C.) He does not introduce the name Campanians at all; though alluding to Iberian mercenaries as men whom Athens calculated on engaging in her service (vi. 90).

But Diodorus mentions, that eight hundred Campanians were engaged by the Chalkidian cities in Sicily for service with the Athenians under Nikias, and that they had escaped during the disasters of the Athenian army (xiii. 44).

The conquest of Cumæ in 416 B. C. opened to these Campanian Samnites an outlet for hired military service beyond sea. Cumæ being in its Origin Chalkidic, would naturally be in correspondence with the Chalkidic cities in Sicily. This forms the link of connection, which explains to us how the Campanians came into service in 413 B. C. under the Athenian general before Syracuse, and afterwards so frequently under others in Sicily (Diodor. xiii. 62-80, etc.).

[19] Strabo, vi. p. 253, 254. See a valuable section on this subject in Niebuhr, Römisch. Geschichte, vol. i. p. 94-98.

It appears that the Syracusan historian Antiochus made no mention either of Lucanians or of Bruttians, though he enumerated the inhabitants of the exact line of territory afterwards occupied by these two nations. After repeating the statement of Antiochus that this territory was occupied by Italians, Œnotrians, and Chonians, Strabo proceeds to say—Οὗτος μὲν οὖν ἁπλουστέρως εἴρηκε καὶ ἀρχαϊκῶς, οὐδὲν διορίσας περὶ τῶν Λευκανῶν καὶ τῶν Βρεττίων. The German translator Grosskurd understands these words as meaning, that Antiochus “did not distinguish the Lucanians from the Bruttians.” But if we read the paragraph through, it will appear, I think, that Strabo means to say, that Antiochus had stated nothing positive respecting either Lucanians or Bruttians. Niebuhr (p. 96 ut suprà) affirms that Antiochus represented the Lucanians as having extended themselves as far as Läus; which I cannot find.

The date of Antiochus seems not precisely ascertainable. His work on Sicilian history was carried down from early times to 424 B. C. (Diodor. xii. 71). His silence respecting the Lucanians goes to confirm the belief that the date of their conquest of the territory called Lucania was considerably later than that year.

Polyænus (ii. 10. 2-4) mentions war as carried on by the inhabitants of Thurii, under Kleandridas the father of Gylippus, against the Lucanians. From the age and circumstances of Kleandridas, this can hardly be later than 420 B. C.

[20] Strabo, vi. p. 256. The Periplus of Skylax (s. 12, 13) recognizes Lucania as extending down to Rhegium. The date to which this Periplus refers appears to be about 370-360 B. C.: see an instructive article among Niebuhr’s Kleine Schriften, p. 105-130. Skylax does not mention the Bruttians (Klausen, Hekatæus and Skylax, p. 274. Berlin, 1831).

At the period which we have now reached, these Lucanians, having conquered the Greek cities of Poseidonia (or Pæstum) and Läus, with much of the territory lying between the Gulfs of Poseidonia and Tarentum, severely harassed the inhabitants of Thurii, and alarmed all the neighboring Greek cities down to Rhegium. So serious was the alarm of these cities, that several of them contracted an intimate defensive alliance, strengthening for the occasion that feeble synodical band, and sense of Italiot communion,[21] the form and trace of which seems to have subsisted without the reality, even under marked enmity between particular cities. The conditions of the newly-contracted alliance were most stringent; not only binding each city to assist at the first summons any other city invaded by the Lucanians, but also pronouncing, that if this obligation were neglected, the generals of the disobedient city should be condemned to death.[22] However, at this time the Italiot Greeks were not less afraid of Dionysius and his aggressive enterprises from the south, than of the Lucanians from the north; and their defensive alliance was intended against both. To Dionysius, on the contrary, the invasion of the Lucanians from landward was a fortunate incident for the success of his own schemes. Their concurrent designs against the same enemies, speedily led to the formation of a distinct alliance between the two.[23] Among the allies of Dionysius, too, we must number the Epizephyrian Lokrians; who not only did not join the Italiot confederacy, but espoused his cause against it with ardor. The enmity of the Lokrians against their neighbors, the Rhegines, was ancient and bitter; exceeded only by that of Dionysius, who never forgave the refusal of the Rhegines to permit him to marry a wife out of their city, and was always grateful to the Lokrians for having granted to him the privilege which their neighbors had refused.

[21] Diodor. xiv. 91-101. Compare Polybius, ii. 39. When Nikias on his way to Sicily, came near to Rhegium and invited the Rhegines to coöperate against Syracuse, the Rhegines declined, replying, ὅ,τι ἂν καὶ τοῖς ἄλλοις Ἰταλιώταις ξυνδοκῇ, τοῦτο ποιήσειν (Thucyd. vi. 44).

[22] Diodor. xiv. 101.

[23] Diodor. xiv. 100.

Wishing as yet, if possible, to avoid provoking the other members of the Italiot confederacy, Dionysius still professed to be revenging himself exclusively upon Rhegium; against which he conducted a powerful force from Syracuse. Twenty thousand foot, one thousand horse, and one hundred and twenty ships of war, are mentioned as the total of his armament. Disembarking near Lokri, he marched across the lower part of the peninsula in a westerly direction, ravaged with fire and sword the Rhegian territory, and then encamped near the strait on the northern side of Rhegium. His fleet followed coastwise round Cape Zephyrium to the same point. While he was pressing the siege, the members of the Italiot synod despatched from Kroton a fleet of sixty sail, to assist in the defence. Their ships, having rounded Cape Zephyrium, were nearing Rhegium from the south, when Dionysius himself approached to attack them, with fifty ships detached from his force. Though inferior in number, his fleet was probably superior in respect to size and equipment; so that the Krotoniate captains, not daring to hazard a battle, ran their ships ashore. Dionysius here attacked them, and would have towed off all the ships (without their crews) as prizes, had not the scene of action lain so near to Rhegium, that the whole force of the city could come forth in reinforcement, while his own army was on the opposite side of the town. The numbers and courage of the Rhegines baffled his efforts, rescued the ships, and hauled them all up upon the shore in safety. Obliged to retire without success, Dionysius was farther overtaken by a terrific storm, which exposed his fleet to the utmost danger. Seven of his ships were driven ashore; their crews, fifteen hundred in number, being either drowned, or falling into the hands of the Rhegines. The rest, after great danger and difficulty, either rejoined the main fleet or got into the harbor of Messênê; where Dionysius himself in his quinquereme also found refuge, but only at midnight, and after imminent risk for several hours. Disheartened by this misfortune as well as by the approach of winter, he withdrew his forces for the present, and returned to Syracuse.[24]

[24] Diodor. xiv 100.

A part of his fleet, however, under Leptines, was despatched northward along the south-western coast of Italy to the Gulf of Elea, to coöperate with the Lucanians; who from that coast and from inland were invading the inhabitants of Thurii on the Tarentine Gulf. Thurii was the successor, though with far inferior power, of the ancient Sybaris; whose dominion had once stretched across from sea to sea, comprehending the town of Läus, now a Lucanian possession.[25] Immediately on the appearance of the Lucanians, the Thurians had despatched an urgent message to their allies, who were making all haste to arrive, pursuant to covenant. But before such junction could possibly take place, the Thurians, confiding in their own native force of fourteen thousand foot, and one thousand horse, marched against the enemy single-handed. The Lucanian invaders retreated, pursued by the Thurians, who followed them even into that mountainous region of the Appenines which stretches between the two seas, and which presents the most formidable danger and difficulty for all military operations.[26] They assailed successfully a fortified post or village of the Lucanians, which fell into their hands with a rich plunder. By such partial advantage they were so elated, that they ventured to cross over all the mountain passes even to the neighborhood of the southern sea, with the intention of attacking the flourishing town of Läus[27]—once the dependency of their Sybaritan predecessors. But the Lucanians, having allured them into these impracticable paths, closed upon them behind with greatly increased numbers, forbade all retreat, and shut them up in a plain surrounded with high and precipitous cliffs. Attacked in this plain by numbers double their own, the unfortunate Thurians underwent one of the most bloody defeats recorded in Grecian history. Out of their fourteen thousand men, ten thousand were slain, under merciless order from the Lucanians to give no quarter. The remainder contrived to flee to a hill near the sea-shore, from whence they saw a fleet of ships of war coasting along at no great distance. Distracted with terror, they were led to fancy, or to hope, that these were the ships expected from Rhegium to their aid; though the Rhegines would naturally send their ships, when demanded, to Thurii, on the Tarentine Gulf, not to the Lower sea near Läus. Under this impression, one thousand of them swam off from the shore to seek protection on shipboard. But they found themselves, unfortunately, on board the fleet of Leptines, brother and admiral of Dionysius, come for the express purpose of aiding the Lucanians. With a generosity not less unexpected than honorable, this officer saved their lives, and also, as it would appear, the lives of all the other defenceless survivors; persuading or constraining the Lucanians to release them, on receiving one mina of silver per man.[28]

[25] Herodot. vi. 21; Strabo, vi. p. 253.

[26] See the description of this mountainous region between the Tarentine Gulf and the Tyrrhenian Sea, in an interesting work by a French General employed in Calabria in 1809—Calabria during a military residence of Three Years, Letters, 17, 18, 19 (translated and published by Effingham Wilson. London, 1832).

[27] Diodor. xiv. 101. βουλόμενοι Λᾶον, πόλιν εὐδαίμονα, πολιορκῆσαι. This appears the true reading: it is an acute conjecture proposed by Niebuhr (Römisch. Geschicht. i. p. 96) in place of the words—βουλόμενοι λαὸν καὶ πόλιν εὐδαίμονα, πολιορκῆσαι.

[28] Diodor. xiv. 102.

This act of Hellenic sympathy restored three or four thousand citizens on ransom to Thurii, instead of leaving them to be massacred or sold by the barbarous Lucanians, and procured the warmest esteem for Leptines personally among the Thurians and other Italiot Greeks. But it incurred the strong displeasure of Dionysius, who now proclaimed openly his project of subjugating these Greeks, and was anxious to encourage the Lucanians as indispensable allies. Accordingly he dismissed Leptines, and named as admiral his other brother Thearides. He then proceeded to conduct a fresh expedition; no longer intended against Rhegium alone, but against all the Italiot Greeks. He departed from Syracuse with a powerful force—twenty thousand foot and three thousand horse, with which, he marched by land in five days to Messênê; his fleet under Thearides accompanying him—forty ships of war, and three hundred transports with provisions. Having first successfully surprised and captured near the Lipari isles a Rhegian squadron of ten ships, the crews of which he constituted prisoners at Messênê, he transported his army across the strait into Italy, and laid siege to Kaulonia—on the eastern coast of the peninsula, and conterminous with the northern border of his allies the Lokrians. He attacked this place vigorously, with the best siege machines which his arsenal furnished.

The Italiot Greeks, on the other hand, mustered their united force to relieve it. Their chief centre of action was Kroton where most of the Syracusan exiles, the most forward of all champions in the cause, were now assembled. One of these exiles, Helôris (who had before been named general by the Rhegines), was intrusted with the command of the collective army; an arrangement neutralizing all local jealousies. Under the cordial sentiment prevailing, an army was mustered at Kroton, estimated at twenty-five thousand foot and two thousand horse; by what cities furnished, or in what proportion, we are unable to say.[29] At the head of these troops, Helôris marched southward from Kroton to the river Elleporus not far from Kaulonia; where Dionysius, raising the siege, met him.[30] He was about four miles and a half from the Krotoniate army, when he learnt from his scouts that Helôris with a chosen regiment of five hundred men (perhaps Syracusan exiles like himself), was considerably in advance of the main body. Moving rapidly forward in the night, Dionysius surprised this advanced guard at break of day, completely isolated from the rest. Helôris, while he despatched instant messages to accelerate the coming up of the main body, defended himself with his small band against overwhelming superiority of numbers. But the odds were too great. After an heroic resistance, he was slain, and his companions nearly all cut to pieces, before the main body, though they came up at full speed, could arrive.

[29] Diodor. xiv. 103.

[30] Polybius (i. 6) gives us the true name of this river: Diodorus calls it the river Helôris.

The hurried pace of the Italiot army, however, though it did not suffice to save the general, was of fatal efficacy in deranging their own soldierlike army. Confused and disheartened by finding that Helôris was slain, which left them without a general to direct the battle or restore order, the Italiots fought for some time against Dionysius, but were at length defeated with severe loss. They effected their retreat from the field of battle to a neighboring eminence, very difficult to attack, yet destitute of water and provisions. Here Dionysius blocked them up, without attempting an attack, but keeping the strictest guard round the hill during the whole remaining day and the ensuing night. The heat of the next day, with total want of water, so subdued their courage, that they sent to Dionysius a herald with propositions, entreating to be allowed to depart on a stipulated ransom. But the terms were peremptorily refused; they were ordered to lay down their arms, and surrender at discretion. Against this terrible requisition they stood out yet awhile, until the increasing pressure of physical exhaustion and suffering drove them to surrender, about the eighth hour of the day.[31]

[31] Diodor. xiv. 105. παρέδωκαν αὑτοὺς περὶ ὀγδόην ὥραν, ἤδη τὰ σώματα παρείμενοι.

More than ten thousand disarmed Greeks descended from the hill and defiled before Dionysius, who numbered the companies as they passed with a stick. As his savage temper was well known, they expected nothing short of the harshest sentence. So much the greater was their astonishment and delight, when they found themselves treated not merely with lenity, but with generosity.[32] Dionysius released them all without even exacting a ransom; and concluded a treaty with most of the cities to which they belonged, leaving their autonomy undisturbed. He received the warmest thanks, accompanied by votes of golden wreaths, from the prisoners as well as from the cities; while among the general public of Greece, the act was hailed as forming the prominent glory of his political life.[33] Such admiration was well deserved, looking to the laws of war then prevalent.

[32] Diodor. xiv. 105. Καὶ πάντων αὐτοῦ ὑποπτευόντων τὸ θηριῶδες, τοὐναντίον ἐφάνη πάντων ἐπιεικέστατος.

[33] Diodor. xiv. 105. καὶ σχεδὸν τοῦτ᾽ ἔδοξε πράττειν ἐν τῷ ζῇν κάλλιστον. Strabo, vi. p. 261.

With the Krotoniates and other Italiot Greeks (except Rhegium and Lokri) Dionysius had had no marked previous relations and therefore had not contracted any strong personal sentiment either of antipathy or favor. With Rhegium and Lokri, the case was different. To the Lokrians he was strongly attached: against the Rhegines his animosity was bitter and implacable, manifesting itself in a more conspicuous manner by contrast with his recent dismissal of the Krotoniate prisoners; a proceeding which had been probably dictated, in great part, by his anxiety to have his hands free for the attack of isolated Rhegium. After having finished the arrangements consequent upon his victory, he marched against that city, and prepared to besiege it. The citizens, feeling themselves without hope of succor, and intimidated by the disaster of their Italiot allies, sent out heralds to beg for moderate terms, and imploring him to abstain from extreme or unmeasured rigor.[34] For a moment, Dionysius seemed to comply with their request. He granted them peace, on condition that they should surrender all their ships of war, seventy in number—that they should pay to him three hundred talents in money—and that they should place in his hands one hundred hostages. All these demands were strictly complied with; upon which Dionysius withdrew his army, and agreed to spare the city.[35]

[34] Diodor. xiv. 106. καὶ παρακαλέσαι μηδὲν περὶ αὐτῶν ~ὑπὲρ ἄνθρωπον~ βουλεύεσθαι.

[35] Diodor. xiv. 106.

His next proceeding was, to attack Kaulonia and Hipponium; two cities which seem between them to have occupied the whole breadth of the Calabrian peninsula, immediately north of Rhegium and Lokri; Kaulonia on the eastern coast, Hipponium on or near the western. Both these cities he besieged, took, and destroyed: probably neither of them, in the hopeless circumstances of the case, made any strenuous resistance. He then caused the inhabitants of both of them, such at least as did not make their escape, to be transported to Syracuse, where he domiciliated them as citizens, allowing them five years of exemption from taxes.[36] To be a citizen of Syracuse meant at this moment, to be a subject of his despotism, and nothing more: how he made room for these new citizens, or furnished them with lands and houses, we are unfortunately not informed. But the territory of both these towns, evacuated by its free inhabitants (though probably not by its slaves, or serfs), was handed over to the Lokrians and annexed to their city. That favored city, which had accepted his offer of marriage, was thus immensely enriched both in lands and in collective property. Here again it would have been interesting to hear what measures were taken to appropriate or distribute the new lands; but our informant is silent.

[36] Diodor. xiv. 106, 107.

Dionysius had thus accumulated into Syracuse, not only all Sicily[37] (to use the language of Plato), but even no inconsiderable portion of Italy. Such wholesale changes of domicile and property must probably have occupied some months; during which time the army of Dionysius seems never to have quitted the Calabrian peninsula, though he himself may probably have gone for a time in person to Syracuse. It was soon seen that the depopulation of Hipponium and Kaulonia was intended only as a prelude to the ruin of Rhegium. Upon this Dionysius had resolved. The recent covenant into which he had entered with the Rhegines, was only a fraudulent device for the purpose of entrapping them into a surrender of their navy, in order that he might afterwards attack them at greater advantage. Marching his army to the Italian shore of the strait, near Rhegium, he affected to busy himself in preparations for crossing to Sicily. In the mean time, he sent a friendly message to the Rhegines, requesting them to supply him for a short time with provisions, under assurance that what they furnished should speedily be replaced from Syracuse. It was his purpose, if they refused, to resent it as an insult, and attack them; if they consented, to consume their provisions, without performing his engagement to replace the quantity consumed; and then to make his attack after all, when their means of holding out had been diminished. At first the Rhegines complied willingly, furnishing abundant supplies. But the consumption continued, and the departure of the army was deferred—first on pretence of the illness of Dionysius, next on other grounds—so that they at length detected the trick, and declined to furnish any more. Dionysius now threw off the mask, gave back to them their hundred hostages, and laid siege to the town in form.[38]

[37] Plato, Epistol. vii. p. 332 D. Διονύσιος δὲ εἰς μίαν πόλιν ἀθροίσας πᾶσαν Σικελίαν ὑπὸ σοφίας, etc.

[38] Diodor. xiv. 107, 108. Polyænus relates this stratagem of Dionysius about the provisions, as if it had been practised at the siege of Himera, and not of Rhegium (Polyæn. v. 3, 10).

Regretting too late that they had suffered themselves to be defrauded of their means of defence, the Rhegines nevertheless prepared to hold out with all the energy of despair. Phyton was chosen commander, the whole population was armed, and all the line of wall carefully watched. Dionysius made vigorous assaults, employing all the resources of his battering machinery to effect a breach. But he was repelled at all points obstinately, and with much loss on both sides: several of his machines were also burnt or destroyed by opportune sallies of the besieged. In one of the assaults, Dionysius himself was seriously wounded by a spear thrust in the groin, from which he was long in recovering. He was at length obliged to convert the siege into a blockade, and to rely upon famine alone for subduing these valiant citizens. For eleven months did the Rhegines hold out, against the pressure of want gradually increasing, and at last terminating in the agony and destruction of famine. We are told that a medimnus of wheat came to be sold for the enormous price of five minæ; at the rate of about £14 sterling per bushel: every horse and every beast of burthen was consumed: at length hides were boiled and eaten, and even the grass on parts of the wall. Many perished from absolute hunger, while the survivors lost all strength and energy. In this intolerable condition, they were constrained, at the end of near eleven months, to surrender at discretion.

So numerous were these victims of famine, that Dionysius, on entering Rhegium, found heaps of unburied corpses, besides six thousand citizens in the last stage of emaciation. All these captives were sent to Syracuse, where those who could provide a mina (about £3 17s.) were allowed to ransom themselves, while the rest were sold as slaves. After such a period of suffering, the number of those who retained the means of ransom was probably very small. But the Rhegine general, Phyton, was detained with all his kindred, and reserved for a different fate. First, his son was drowned, by order of Dionysius: next, Phyton himself was chained to one of the loftiest siege-machines, as a spectacle to the whole army. While he was thus exhibited to scorn, a messenger was sent to apprise him, that Dionysius had just caused his son to be drowned. “He is more fortunate than his father by one day,” was the reply of Phyton. After a certain time, the sufferer was taken down from his pillory, and led round the city, with attendants scourging and insulting him at every step; while a herald proclaimed aloud, “Behold the man who persuaded the Rhegines to war, thus signally punished by Dionysius!” Phyton, enduring all these torments with heroic courage and dignified silence, was provoked to exclaim in reply to the herald, that the punishment was inflicted because he had refused to betray the city to Dionysius, who would himself soon be overtaken by the divine vengeance. At length the prolonged outrages, combined with the noble demeanor and high reputation of the victim, excited compassion even among the soldiers of Dionysius himself. Their murmurs became so pronounced, that he began to apprehend an open mutiny for the purpose of rescuing Phyton. Under this fear he gave orders that the torments should be discontinued, and that Phyton with his entire kindred should be drowned.[39]

[39] Diodor. xiv. 112. Ὁ δὲ Φύτων, κατὰ τὴν πολιορκίαν στρατηγὸς ἀγαθὸς γεγενημένος, καὶ κατὰ τὸν ἄλλον βίον ἐπαινούμενος, οὐκ ἀγεννῶς ὑπέμενε τὴν ἐπὶ τῆς τελευτῆς τιμωρίαν· ἀλλ᾽ ἀκατάπληκτον τὴν ψυχὴν φυλάξας, καὶ βοῶν, ὅτι τὴν πόλιν οὐ βουληθεὶς προδοῦναι Διονυσίῳ τυγχάνει τῆς τιμωρίας, ἣν αὐτῷ τὸ δαιμόνιον ἐκείνῳ συντόμως ἐπιστήσει· ὥστε τὴν ἀρετὴν τἀνδρὸς καὶ παρὰ τοῖς στρατιώταις τοῦ Διονυσίου κατελεεῖσθαι, καί τινας ἤδη θορυβεῖν. Ὁ δὲ Διονύσιος, εὐλαβηθεὶς μή τινες τῶν στρατιωτῶν ἀποτολμήσωσιν ἐξαρπάζειν τὸν Φύτωνα, παυσάμενος τῆς τιμωρίας, κατεπόντωσε τὸν ἀτυχῆ μετὰ τῆς συγγενείας. Οὗτος μὲν οὖν ἀναξίως τῆς ἀρετῆς ἐκνόμοις περιέπεσε τιμωρίαις, καὶ πολλοὺς ἔσχε καὶ τότε τῶν Ἑλλήνων τοὺς ἀλγήσαντας τὴν συμφορὰν, καὶ μετὰ ταῦτα ποιητὰς τοὺς θρηνήσοντας τὸ τῆς περιπετείας ἐλεεινόν.

The prophetic persuasion under which this unhappy man perished, that divine vengeance would soon overtake his destroyer, was noway borne out by the subsequent reality. The power and prosperity of Dionysius underwent abatement by his war with the Carthaginians in 383 B. C., yet remained very considerable even to his dying day. And the misfortunes which fell thickly upon his son the younger Dionysius, more than thirty years afterwards, though they doubtless received a religious interpretation from contemporary critics, were probably ascribed to acts more recent than the barbarities inflicted on Phyton. But these barbarities, if not avenged, were at least laid to heart with profound sympathy by the contemporary world, and even commemorated with tenderness and pathos by poets. While Dionysius was composing tragedies (of which more presently) in hopes of applause in Greece, he was himself furnishing real matter of history, not less tragical than the sufferings of those legendary heroes and heroines to which he (in common with other poets) resorted for a subject. Among the many acts of cruelty, more or less aggravated, which it is the melancholy duty of an historian of Greece to recount, there are few so revolting as the death of the Rhegine general; who was not a subject, nor a conspirator, nor a rebel, but an enemy in open warfare—of whom the worst that even Dionysius himself could say, was, that he had persuaded his countrymen into the war. And even this could not be said truly; since the antipathy of the Rhegines towards Dionysius was of old standing, traceable to his enslavement of Naxos and Katana, if not to causes yet earlier—though the statement of Phyton may very probably be true, that Dionysius had tried to bribe him to betray Rhegium (as the generals of Naxos and Katana had been bribed to betray their respective cities), and was incensed beyond measure at finding the proposition repelled. The Hellenic war-practice was in itself sufficiently cruel. Both Athenians and Lacedæmonians put to death prisoners of war by wholesale, after the capture of Melos, after the battle of Ægospotami, and elsewhere. But to make death worse than death by a deliberate and protracted tissue of tortures and indignities, is not Hellenic; it is Carthaginian and Asiatic. Dionysius had shown himself better than a Greek when he released without ransom the Krotoniate prisoners captured at the battle of Kaulonia; but he became far worse than a Greek, and worse even than his own mercenaries, when he heaped aggravated suffering, beyond the simple death-warrant, on the heads of Phyton and his kindred.

Dionysius caused the city of Rhegium to be destroyed[40] or dismantled. Probably he made over the lands to Lokri, like those of Kaulonia and Hipponium. The free Rhegine citizens had all been transported to Syracuse for sale; and those who were fortunate enough to save their liberty by providing the stipulated ransom, would not be allowed to come back to their native soil. If Dionysius was so zealous in enriching the Lokrians, as to transfer to them two other neighboring town-domains, against the inhabitants of which he had no peculiar hatred—much more would he be disposed to make the like transfer of the Rhegine territory, whereby he would gratify at once his antipathy to the one state and his partiality to the other. It is true that Rhegium did not permanently continue incorporated with Lokri; but neither did Kaulonia nor Hipponium. The maintenance of all the three transfers depended on the ascendency of Dionysius and his dynasty; but for the time immediately succeeding the capture of Rhegium, the Lokrians became masters of the Rhegine territory as well as of the two other townships, and thus possessed all the Calabrian peninsula south of the Gulf of Squillace. To the Italiot Greeks generally, these victories of Dionysius were fatally ruinous, because the political union formed among them, for the purpose of resisting the pressure of the Lucanians from the interior, was overthrown, leaving each city to its own weakness and isolation.[41]

[40] Strabo, vi. p. 258 ἐπιφανῆ δ᾽ οὖν πόλιν οὖσαν ... κατασκάψαι Διονύσιον, etc.

[41] Polybius, ii. 39, 67.

The year 387, in which Rhegium surrendered, was also distinguished for two other memorable events; the general peace in Central Greece under the dictation of Persia and Sparta, commonly called the peace of Antalkidas; and the capture of Rome by the Gauls.[42]

[42] Polybius, i. 6.

The two great ascendant powers in the Grecian world were now, Sparta in Peloponnesus, and Dionysius in Sicily; each respectively fortified by alliance with the other. I have already in a former chapter[43] described the position of Sparta after the peace of Antalkidas; how greatly she gained by making herself the champion of that Persian rescript—and how she purchased, by surrendering the Asiatic Greeks to Artaxerxes, an empire on land equal to that which she had enjoyed before the defeat of Knidus, though without recovering the maritime empire fortified by that defeat.

[43] Chap. LXXVI. Vol. X.

To this great imperial state, Dionysius in the west formed a suitable counterpart. His recent victories in Southern Italy had already raised his power to a magnitude transcending all the far-famed recollections of Gelon; but he now still farther extended it by sending an expedition against Kroton. This city, the largest in Magna Græcia, fell under his power; and he succeeded in capturing, by surprise or bribery, even its strong citadel; on a rock overhanging the sea.[44] He seems also to have advanced yet farther with his fleet to attack Thurii; which city owed its preservation solely to the violence of the north winds. He plundered the temple of Hêrê near Cape Lakinium, in the domain of Kroton. Among the ornaments of this temple was one of pre-eminent beauty and celebrity, which at the periodical festivals was exhibited to admiring spectators: a robe wrought with the greatest skill, and decorated in the most costly manner, the votive offering of a Sybarite named Alkimenes. Dionysius sold this robe to the Carthaginians. It long remained as one of the permanent religious ornaments of their city, being probably dedicated to the honor of those Hellenic Deities recently introduced for worship; whom (as I have before stated) the Carthaginians were about this time peculiarly anxious to propitiate, in hopes of averting or alleviating the frightful pestilences wherewith they had been so often smitten. They purchased the robe from Dionysius at the prodigious price of one hundred and twenty talents, or about £27,600 sterling.[45] Incredible as this sum may appear, we must recollect that the honor done to the new gods would be mainly estimated according to the magnitude of the sum laid out. As the Carthaginians would probably think no price too great to transfer an unrivalled vestment from the wardrobe of the Lakinian Hêrê to the newly-established temple and worship of Dêmêtêr and Persephonê in their city—so we may be sure that the loss of such an ornament, and the spoliation of the holy place, would deeply humiliate the Krotoniates, and with them the crowd of Italiot Greeks who frequented the Lakinian festivals.

[44] Livy has preserved the mention of this important acquisition of Dionysius (xxiv. 3).

“Sed arx Crotonis, unâ parte imminens mari, alterâ vergente in agrum, situ tantum naturali quondam munita, postea et muro cincta est, quâ per aversas rupes ab Dionysio Siciliæ tyranno per dolum fuerat capta.”

Justin also (xx. 5) mentions the attack of Dionysius upon Kroton.

We may, with tolerable certainty, refer the capture to the present part of the career of Dionysius.

See also Ælian, V. H. xii. 61.

[45] Aristotel. Auscult. Mirab. s. 96; Athenæus, xii. p. 541; Diodor. xiv. 77.

Polemon specified this costly robe, in his work Περὶ τῶν ἐν Καρχηδόνι Πέπλων....

Thus master of the important city of Kroton, with a citadel near the sea capable of being held by a separate garrison, Dionysius divested the inhabitants of their southern possession of Skylletium, which he made over to aggrandize yet farther the town of Lokri.[46] Whether he pushed his conquests farther along the Tarentine Gulf so as to acquire the like hold on Thurii or Metapontum, we cannot say. But both of them must have been overawed by the rapid extension and near approach of his power; especially Thurii, not yet recovered from her disastrous defeat by the Lucanians.

[46] Strabo, vi. p. 261.

Profiting by his maritime command of the Gulf, Dionysius was enabled to enlarge his ambitious views even to distant ultramarine enterprises. To escape from his long arm, Syracusan exiles were obliged to flee to a greater distance, and one of their divisions either founded, or was admitted into, the city of Ancona, high up the Adriatic Gulf.[47] On the other side of that Gulf, in vicinity and alliance with the Illyrian tribes, Dionysius on his part sent a fleet, and established more than one settlement. To these schemes he was prompted by a dispossessed prince of the Epirotic Molossians, named Alketas, who, residing at Syracuse as an exile, had gained his confidence. He founded the town of Lissus (now Alessio) on the Illyrian coast, considerably north of Epidamnus; and he assisted the Parians in their plantation of two Grecian settlements, in sites still farther northward up the Adriatic Gulf—the islands of Issa and Pharos. His admiral at Lissus defeated the neighboring Illyrian coast-boats, which harassed these newly-settled Parians; but with the Illyrian tribes near to Lissus, he maintained an intimate alliance, and even furnished a large number of them with Grecian panoplies. It is affirmed to have been the purpose of Dionysius and Alketas to employ these warlike barbarians, first in invading Epirus and restoring Alketas to his Molossian principality; next in pillaging the wealthy temple of Delphi—a scheme far-reaching, yet not impracticable, and capable of being seconded by a Syracusan fleet, if circumstances favored its execution. The invasion of Epirus was accomplished, and the Molossians were defeated in a bloody battle, wherein fifteen thousand of them are said to have been slain. But the ulterior projects against Delphi were arrested by the intervention of Sparta, who sent a force to the spot and prevented all further march southward.[48] Alketas however seems to have remained prince of a portion of Epirus, in the territory nearly opposite to Korkyra; where we have already recognized him, in a former chapter, as having become the dependent of Jason of Pheræ in Thessaly.

[47] Strabo, v. p. 241. It would seem that the two maritime towns, said to have been founded on the coast of Apulia on the Adriatic by Dionysius the younger during the first years of his reign—according to Diodorus (xvi. 5)—must have been really founded by the elder Dionysius, near about the time to which we have now reached.

[48] Diodor. xv. 13, 14.

Another enterprise undertaken by Dionysius about this time was a maritime expedition along the coasts of Latium, Etruria, and Corsica; partly under color of repressing the piracies committed from their maritime cities; but partly also, for the purpose of pillaging the rich and holy temple of Leukothea, at Agylla or its seaport Pyrgi. In this he succeeded, stripping it of money and precious ornaments to the amount of one thousand talents. The Agyllæans came forth to defend their temple, but were completely worsted, and lost so much both in plunder and in prisoners, that Dionysius, after returning to Syracuse and selling the prisoners, obtained an additional profit of five hundred talents.[49]

[49] Diodor. xv. 14; Strabo, v. p. 226; Servius ad Virgil. Æneid. x. 184.

Such was the military celebrity now attained by Dionysius,[50] that the Gauls from Northern Italy, who had recently sacked Rome, sent to proffer their alliance and aid. He accepted the proposition; from whence perhaps the Gallic mercenaries whom we afterwards find in his service as mercenaries, may take their date. His long arms now reached from Lissus on one side to Agylla on the other. Master of most of Sicily and much of Southern Italy, as well as of the most powerful standing army in Greece—the unscrupulous plunderer of the holiest temples everywhere[51]—he inspired much terror and dislike throughout Central Greece. He was the more vulnerable to this sentiment, as he was not only a triumphant prince, but also a tragic poet; competitor, as such, for that applause and admiration which no force can extort. Since none of his tragedies have been preserved, we can form no judgment of our own respecting them. Yet when we learn that he had stood second or third, and that one of his compositions gained even the first prize at the Lenæan festival at Athens,[52] in 368-367 B. C.—the favorable judgment of an Athenian audience affords good reason for presuming that his poetical talents were considerable.

[50] Justin, xx. 5; Xenoph. Hellen. vii. 1, 20.

[51] See Pseudo-Aristotel. Œconomic. ii. 20-41; Cicero, De Natur. Deor. iii. 34, 82, 85: in which passages, however, there must be several incorrect assertions as to the actual temples pillaged; for Dionysius could not have been in Peloponnesus to rob the temple of Zeus at Olympia, or of Æsculapius at Epidaurus.

Athenæus (xv. p. 693) recounts an anecdote that Dionysius plundered the temple of Æsculapius at Syracuse of a valuable golden table; which is far more probable.

[52] Diodor. xv. 74. See Mr. Fynes Clinton, Fast. Hellen. ad ann. 367 B. C.

During the years immediately succeeding 387 B. C., however, Dionysius the poet was not likely to receive an impartial hearing anywhere. For while on the one hand his own circle would applaud every word—on the other hand, a large proportion of independent Greeks would be biassed against what they heard by their fear and hatred of the author. If we believed the anecdotes recounted by Diodorus, we should conclude not merely that the tragedies were contemptible compositions, but that the irritability of Dionysius in regard to criticism was exaggerated even to silly weakness. The dithyrambic poet Philoxenus, a resident or visitor at Syracuse, after hearing one of these tragedies privately recited, was asked his opinion. He gave an unfavorable opinion, for which he was sent to prison:[53] on the next day the intercession of friends procured his release, and he contrived afterwards, by delicate wit and double-meaning phrases, to express an inoffensive sentiment without openly compromising truth. At the Olympic festival of 388 B. C., Dionysius had sent some of his compositions to Olympia, together with the best actors and chorists to recite them. But so contemptible were the poems (we are told), that in spite of every advantage of recitation, they were disgracefully hissed and ridiculed; moreover the actors in coming back to Syracuse were shipwrecked, and the crew of the ship ascribed all the suffering of their voyage to the badness of the poems entrusted to them. The flatterers of Dionysius, however (it is said), still continued to extol his genius, and to assure him that his ultimate success as a poet, though for a time interrupted by envy, was infallible; which Dionysius believed, and continued to compose tragedies without being disheartened.[54]

[53] See a different version of the story about Philoxenus in Plutarch, De Fortun. Alexand. Magni, p. 334 C.

[54] Diodor. xiv. 109; xv. 6.

Amidst such malicious jests, circulated by witty men at the expense of the princely poet, we may trace some important matter of fact. Perhaps in the year 388 B. C., but certainly in the year 384 B. C. (both of them Olympic years), Dionysius sent tragedies to be recited, and chariots to run, before the crowd assembled in festival at Olympia. The year 387 B. C. was a memorable year both in Central Greece and in Sicily. In the former, it was signalized by the momentous peace of Antalkidas, which terminated a general war of eight years’ standing: in the latter, it marked the close of the Italian campaign of Dionysius, with the defeat and humiliation of Kroton and the other Italiot Greeks, and subversion of three Grecian cities,—Hipponium, Kaulonia, and Rhegium—the fate of the Rhegines having been characterized by incidents most pathetic and impressive. The first Olympic festival which occurred after 387 B. C. was accordingly a distinguished epoch. The two festivals immediately preceding (those of 392 B. C. and 388 B. C.) having been celebrated in the midst of a general war, had not been visited by a large proportion of the Hellenic body; so that the next ensuing festival, the 99th Olympiad in 384 B. C., was stamped with a peculiar character (like the 90th Olympiad[55] in 420 B. C.) as bringing together in religious fraternity those who had long been separated.[56] To every ambitious Greek (as to Alkibiades in 420 B. C.) it was an object of unusual ambition to make individual figure at such a festival. To Dionysius, the temptation was peculiarly seductive, since he was triumphant over all neighboring enemies—at the pinnacle of his power—and disengaged from all war requiring his own personal command. Accordingly he sent thither his Theôre, or solemn legation for sacrifice, decked in the richest garments, furnished with abundant gold and silver plate, and provided with splendid tents to serve for their lodging on the sacred ground of Olympia. He farther sent several chariots-and-four to contend in the regular chariot races: and lastly, he also sent reciters and chorists, skilful as well as highly trained, to exhibit his own poetical compositions before such as were willing to hear them. We must remember that poetical recitation was not included in the formal programme of the festival.

[55] See Vol. VII. of this History, Ch. LV. p. 57 seqq.

[56] See above, in this work, Vol. X. Ch. LXXVII. p. 76. I have already noticed the peculiarity of this Olympic festival of 384 B. C., in reference to the position and sentiment of the Greeks in Peloponnesus and Asia. I am now obliged to notice it again, in reference to the Greeks of Sicily and Italy—especially to Dionysius.

All this prodigious outfit, under the superintendence of Thearides, brother of Dionysius, was exhibited with dazzling effect before the Olympic crowd. No name stood so prominently and ostentatiously before them as that of the despot of Syracuse. Every man, even from the most distant regions of Greece, was stimulated to inquire into his past exploits and character. There were probably many persons present, peculiarly forward in answering such inquiries—the numerous sufferers, from Italian and Sicilian Greece, whom his conquests had thrown into exile; and their answers would be of a nature to raise the strongest antipathy against Dionysius. Besides the numerous depopulations and mutations of inhabitants which he had occasioned in Sicily, we have already seen that he had, within the last three years, extinguished three free Grecian communities—Rhegium, Kaulonia, Hipponium; transporting all the inhabitants of the two latter to Syracuse. In the case of Kaulonia, an accidental circumstance occurred to impress its recent extinction vividly upon the spectators. The runner who gained the great prize in the stadium, in 384 B. C., was Dikon, a native of Kaulonia. He was a man preëminently swift of foot, celebrated as having gained previous victories in the stadium, and always proclaimed (pursuant to custom) along with the title of his native city—“Dikon the Kauloniate.” To hear this well-known runner now proclaimed as “Dikon the Syracusan,”[57] gave painful publicity to the fact, that the free community of Kaulonia no longer existed,—and to the absorptions of Grecian freedom effected by Dionysius.

[57] Diodor. xv. 14. Παρὰ δ᾽ Ἠλείοις Ὀλυμπιὰς ἤχθη ἐννενηκοστὴ ἐννάτη (B. C. 384), καθ᾽ ἣν ἐνίκα στάδιον Δίκων Συρακούσιος.

Pausanias, vi. 3, 5. Δίκων δὲ ὁ Καλλιμβρότου πέντε μὲν Πυθοῖ δρόμου νίκας, τρεῖς δὲ ἀνείλετο Ἰσθμίων, τέσσαρας δὲ ἐν Νεμέᾳ, καὶ Ὀλυμπιακὰς μίαν μὲν ἐν παισὶ, δύο δὲ ἄλλας ἀνδρῶν· καὶ οἱ καὶ ἀνδριάντες ἴσοι ταῖς νίκαις εἰσὶν ἐν Ὀλυμπίᾳ· παιδὶ μὲν δὴ ὄντι αὐτῷ ~Καυλωνιάτῃ, καθάπερ γε καὶ ἦν, ὑπῆρξεν ἀναγορευθῆναι~· τὸ δὲ ἀπὸ τούτου ~Συρακούσιον αὑτὸν ἀνηγόρευσεν ἐπὶ χρήμασι~.

Pausanias here states, that Dikon received a bribe to permit himself to be proclaimed as a Syracusan, and not as a Kauloniate. Such corruption did occasionally take place (compare another case of similar bribery, attempted by Syracusan envoys, Pausan. vi. 2, 4), prompted by the vanity of the Grecian cities to appropriate to themselves the celebrity of a distinguished victor at Olympia. But in this instance, the blame imputed to Dikon is more than he deserves. Kaulonia had been already depopulated and incorporated with Lokri; the inhabitants being taken away to Syracuse and made Syracusan citizens (Diodor. xiv. 106). Dikon therefore could not have been proclaimed a Kauloniate, even had he desired it—when the city of Kaulonia no longer existed. The city was indeed afterwards reëstablished; and this circumstance doubtless contributed to mislead Pausanias, who does not seem to have been aware of its temporary subversion by Dionysius.

In following the history of affairs in Central Greece, I have already dwelt upon the strong sentiment excited among Grecian patriots by the peace of Antalkidas, wherein Sparta made herself the ostentatious champion and enforcer of a Persian rescript, purchased by surrendering the Asiatic Greeks to the Great King. It was natural that this emotion should manifest itself at the next ensuing Olympic festival in 384 B. C., wherein not only Spartans, Athenians, Thebans, and Corinthians, but also Asiatic and Sicilian Greeks, were reunited after a long separation. The emotion found an eloquent spokesman in the orator Lysias. Descended from Syracusan ancestors, and once a citizen of Thurii,[58] Lysias had peculiar grounds for sympathy with the Sicilian and Italian Greeks. He delivered a public harangue upon the actual state of political affairs, in which he dwelt upon the mournful present and upon the serious dangers of the future. “The Grecian world (he said) is burning away at both extremities. Our eastern brethren have passed into slavery under the Great King, our western under the despotism of Dionysius.[59] These two are the great potentates, both in naval force and in money, the real instruments of dominion:[60] if both of them combine, they will extinguish what remains of freedom in Greece. They have been allowed to consummate all this ruin unopposed, because of the past dissensions among the leading Grecian cities; but it is now high time that these cities should unite cordially to oppose farther ruin. How can Sparta, our legitimate president, sit still while the Hellenic world is on fire and consuming? The misfortunes of our ruined brethren ought to be to us as our own. Let us not lie idle, waiting until Artaxerxes and Dionysius attack us with their united force: let us check their insolence at once, while it is yet in our power.”[61]

[58] Dionys. Hal. Judic. de Lysâ, p. 452, Reisk.

[59] Lysias, Fragm. Orat. 33. ap. Dionys. Hal. p. 521. ὁρῶν οὕτως αἰσχρῶς διακειμένην τὴν Ἑλλάδα, καὶ πολλὰ μὲν αὐτῆς ὄντα ὑπὸ τῷ βαρβάρῳ, πολλὰς δὲ πόλεις ὑπὸ τυράννων ἀναστάτους γεγενημένας.

[60] Lysias, Fr. Or. 33. l. c. Ἐπίστασθε δὲ, ὅτι ἡ μὲν ἀρχὴ τῶν κρατούντων τῆς θαλάττης, τῶν δὲ χρημάτων βασιλεὺς ταμίας· τὰ δὲ τῶν Ἑλλήνων σώματα τῶν δαπανᾶσθαι δυναμένων· ναῦς δὲ πολλὰς αὐτὸς κέκτηται, πολλὰς δ᾽ ὁ τύραννος τῆς Σικελίας.

[61] Lysias, Orat. Frag. l. c. Θαυμάζω δὲ Λακεδαιμονίους πάντων μάλιστα, τίνι ποτε γνώμῃ χρώμενοι, καιομένην τὴν Ἑλλάδα περιορῶσιν, ἡγεμόνες ὄντες τῶν Ἑλλήνων, οὐκ ἀδίκως, etc.

Οὐ γὰρ ἀλλοτρίας δεῖ τὰς τῶν ἀπολωλότων συμφορὰς νομίζειν ἀλλ᾽ οἰκείας· ~οὐδ᾽ ἀναμεῖναι, ἕως ἂν ἐπ᾽ αὐτοὺς ἡμᾶς αἱ δυνάμεις ἀμφοτέρων ἔλθωσιν, ἀλλ᾽ ἕως ἔτι ἔξεστι, τὴν τούτων ὕβριν κωλῦσαι~.

I give in the text the principal points of what remains out of this discourse of Lysias, without confining myself to the words.

Unfortunately we possess but a scanty fragment of this emphatic harangue (a panegyrical harangue, in the ancient sense of the word) delivered at Olympia by Lysias. But we see the alarming picture of the time which he labored to impress: Hellas already enslaved, both in the east and in the west, by the two greatest potentates of the age,[62] Artaxerxes and Dionysius—and now threatened in her centre by their combined efforts. To feel the full probability of so gloomy an anticipation, we must recollect that only in the preceding year Dionysius, already master of Sicily and of a considerable fraction of Italian Greece, had stretched his naval force across to Illyria, armed a host of Illyrian barbarians, and sent them southward under Alketas against the Molossians, with the view of ultimately proceeding farther and pillaging the Delphian temple. The Lacedæmonians had been obliged to send a force to arrest their progress.[63] No wonder then that Lysias should depict the despot of Syracuse as meditating ulterior projects against Central Greece; and as an object not only of hatred for what he had done, but of terror for what he was about to do, in conjunction with the other great enemy from the east.[64]

[62] Diodor. xv. 23. οἱ μέγιστοι τῶν τότε δυναστῶν, etc.

[63] Diodor. xv. 13.

[64] Isokrates holds similar language, both about the destructive conquests of Dionysius, and the past sufferings and present danger of Hellas, in his Orat. IV. (Panegyric.) composed about 380 B. C., and (probably enough) read at the Olympic festival of that year (s. 197). ἴσως δ᾽ ἂν καὶ τῆς ἐμῆς εὐηθείας πολλοὶ καταγελάσειαν, εἰ δυστυχίας ἀνδρῶν ὀδυροίμην ἐν τοιούτοις καιροῖς, ἐν οἷς Ἰταλία μὲν ἀνάστατος γέγονε, Σικελία δὲ καταδεδούλωται (compare s. 145), τοσαῦται δὲ πόλεις τοῖς βαρβάροις ἐκδέδονται, τὰ δὲ λοιπὰ μέρη τῶν Ἑλλήνων ἐν τοῖς μεγίστοις κινδύνοις ἐστίν.

Isokrates had addressed a letter to the elder Dionysius. He alludes briefly to it in his Orat. ad Philippum (Orat. v. s. 93), in terms which appear to indicate that it was bold and plain spoken (θρασύτερον τῶν ἄλλων). The first letter, among the ten ascribed to Isokrates, purports to be a letter to Dionysius; but it seems rather (to judge by the last words) to be the preface of a letter about to follow. Nothing distinct can be made out from it as it now stands.

Of these two enemies, one (the Persian King) was out of reach. But the second—Dionysius—though not present in person, stood forth by his envoys and appurtenances conspicuous even to ostentation, beyond any man on the ground. His Theôry or solemn legation outshone every other by the splendor of its tents and decorations: his chariots to run in the races were magnificent: his horses were of rare excellence, bred from the Venetian stock, imported out of the innermost depths of the Adriatic Gulf:[65] his poems, recited by the best artists in Greece, solicited applause—by excellent delivery and fine choric equipments, if not by superior intrinsic merit. Now the antipathy against Dionysius was not only aggravated by all this display, contrasted with the wretchedness of impoverished exiles whom he had dispossessed—but was also furnished with something to strike at and vent itself upon. Of such opportunity for present action against a visible object, Lysias did not fail to avail himself. While he vehemently preached a crusade to dethrone Dionysius and liberate Sicily, he at the same time pointed to the gold and purple tent before them, rich and proud above all its fellows, which lodged the brother of the despot with his Syracusan legation. He exhorted his hearers to put forth at once an avenging hand, in partial retribution for the sufferings of free Greece, by plundering the tent which insulted them by its showy decorations. He adjured them to interfere and prevent the envoys of this impious despot from sacrificing or entering their chariots in the lists, or taking any part in the holy Pan-hellenic festival.[66]

[65] Strabo, v. p. 212.

[66] Dionys. Hal. p. 519. Jud. de Lysiâ. Ἐστὶ δή τις αὐτῷ πανηγυρικὸς λόγος, ἐν ᾧ πείθει τοὺς Ἕλληνας ... ἐκβάλλειν Διονύσιον τὸν τύραννον τῆς ἀρχῆς, καὶ Σικελίαν ἐλευθερῶσαι, ἄρξασθαί τε τῆς ἐχθρᾶς αὐτίκα μάλα, διαρπάσαντας τὴν τοῦ τυράννου σκηνὴν χρυσῷ τε καὶ πορφύρᾳ καὶ ἄλλῳ πλούτῳ πολλῷ κεκοσμημένην, etc.

Diodor. xiv. 109. Λυσίας ... προετρέπετο τὰ πλήθη μὴ προσδέχεσθαι τοῖς ἱεροῖς ἀγῶσι τοὺς ἐξ ἀσεβεστάτης τυραννίδος ἀπεσταλμένους θεωρούς.

Compare Plutarch Vit. x. Orator, p. 836 D.

We cannot doubt that a large proportion of the spectators on the plain of Olympia felt with greater or less intensity the generous Pan-hellenic patriotism and indignation to which Lysias gave utterance. To what extent his hearers acted upon the unbecoming violence of his practical recommendations—how far they actually laid hands on the tents, or tried to hinder the Syracusans from sacrificing, or impeded the bringing out of their chariots for the race—we are unable to say. We are told that some ventured to plunder the tents:[67] how much was effected we do not hear. It is certain that the superintending Eleian authorities would interfere most strenuously to check any such attempt at desecrating the festival, and to protect the Syracusan envoys in their tents, their regular sacrifice, and their chariot-running. And it is farther certain, as far as our account goes, that the Syracusan chariots actually did run on the lists; because they were, though by various accidents, disgracefully unsuccessful, or overturned and broken in pieces.[68]

[67] Diodor. xiv. 109. ὥστε τινὰς τολμῆσαι διαρπάζειν τὰς σκηνάς.

[68] Diodor. xiv. 109.

To any one however who reflects on the Olympic festival, with all its solemnity and its competition for honors of various kinds, it will appear that the mere manifestation of so violent an antipathy, even though restrained from breaking out into act, would be sufficiently galling to the Syracusan envoys. But the case would be far worse, when the poems of Dionysius came to be recited. These were volunteer manifestations, delivered (like the harangue of Lysias) before such persons as chose to come and hear; not comprised in the regular solemnity, nor therefore under any peculiar protection by the Eleian authorities. Dionysius stood forward of his own accord to put himself upon his trial as a poet before the auditors. Here therefore the antipathy against the despot might be manifested by the most unreserved explosions. And when we are told that the badness of the poems[69] caused them to be received with opprobrious ridicule, in spite of the excellence of the recitation, it is easy to see that the hatred intended for the person of Dionysius was discharged upon his verses. Of course the hissers and hooters would make it clearly understood what they really meant, and would indulge in the full license of heaping curses upon his name and acts. Neither the best reciters of Greece, nor the best poems even of Sophokles or Pindar, could have any chance against such predetermined antipathy. And the whole scene would end in the keenest disappointment and humiliation, inflicted upon the Syracusan envoys as well as upon the actors; being the only channel through which the retributive chastisement of Hellas could be made to reach the author.

[69] Diodor. xiv. 109.

Though not present in person at Olympia, the despot felt the chastisement in his inmost soul. The mere narrative of what had passed plunged him into an agony of sorrow, which for some time seemed to grow worse by brooding on the scene, and at length drove him nearly mad. He was smitten with intolerable consciousness of the profound hatred borne towards him, even throughout a large portion of the distant and independent Hellenic world. He fancied that this hatred was shared by all around him, and suspected every one as plotting against his life. To such an excess of cruelty did this morbid excitement carry him, that he seized several of his best friends, under false accusations, or surmises, and caused them to be slain.[70] Even his brother Leptinês, and his ancient partisan Philistus, men who had devoted their lives first to his exaltation, and afterwards to his service, did not escape. Having given umbrage to him by an intermarriage between their families made without his privity, both were banished from Syracuse, and retired to Thurii in Italy, where they received that shelter and welcome which Leptinês had peculiarly merited by his conduct in the Lucanian war. The exile of Leptinês did not last longer than (apparently) about a year, after which Dionysius relented, recalled him, and gave him his daughter in marriage. But Philistus remained in banishment more than sixteen years; not returning to Syracuse until after the death of Dionysius the elder, and the accession of Dionysius the younger.[71]

[70] Diodor. xv. 7. Ὁ δὲ Διονύσιος, ἀκούσας τὴν τῶν ποιημάτων καταφρόνησιν, ἐνέπεσεν εἰς ὑπερβολὴν λύπης. Ἀεὶ δὲ μᾶλλον τοῦ πάθους ἐπίτασιν λαμβάνοντος, μανιωδὴς διάθεσις κάτεσχε τὴν ψυχὴν αὐτοῦ, καὶ φθονεῖν αὐτῷ φάσκων ἅπαντας, τοὺς φίλους ὑπώπτευεν ὡς ἐπιβουλεύοντας· καὶ πέρας, ἐπὶ τοσοῦτο προῆλθε λύπης καὶ παρακοπῆς, ὥστε τῶν φίλων πολλοὺς μὲν ἐπὶ ψευδέσιν αἰτίαις ἀνελεῖν, οὐκ ὀλίγους δὲ καὶ ἐφυγάδευσεν· ἐν οἷς ἦν Φίλιστος καὶ Λεπτίνης ὁ ἀδελφὸς, etc.

[71] For the banishment, and the return of Philistus and Leptinês, compare Diodor. xv. 7, and Plutarch, Dion. c. 11. Probably it was on this occasion that Polyxenus, the brother-in-law of Dionysius, took flight as the only means of preserving his life (Plutarch, Dion. c. 21).

Plutarch mentions the incident which offended Dionysius and caused both Philistus and Leptinês to be banished. Diodorus does not notice this incident; yet it is not irreconcilable with his narrative. Plutarch does not mention the banishment of Leptinês, but only that of Philistus.

On the other hand, he affirms (and Nepos also, Dion. c. 3) that Philistus did not return until after the death of the elder Dionysius, while Diodorus states his return conjointly with that of Leptinês—not indicating any difference of time. Here I follow Plutarch’s statement as the more probable.

There is, however, one point which is perplexing. Plutarch (Timoleon, c. 15) animadverts upon a passage in the history of Philistus, wherein that historian had dwelt, with a pathos which Plutarch thinks childish and excessive, upon the melancholy condition of the daughters of Leptinês, “who had fallen from the splendor of a court into a poor and mean condition.” How is this reconcilable with the fact stated by Diodorus, that Leptinês was recalled from exile by Dionysius after a short time, taken into favor again, and invested with command at the battle of Kronium, where he was slain? It seems difficult to believe that Philistus could have insisted with so much sympathy upon the privations endured by the daughters of Leptinês, if the exile of the father had lasted only a short time.

Such was the memorable scene at the Olympic festival of 384 B. C., together with its effect upon the mind of Dionysius. Diodorus, while noticing all the facts, has cast an air of ridicule over them by recognizing nothing except the vexation of Dionysius, at the ill success of his poem, as the cause of his mental suffering; and by referring to the years 388 B. C. and 386 B. C., that which properly belongs to 384 B. C.[72] Now it is improbable, in the first place, that the poem of Dionysius,—himself a man of ability and having every opportunity of profiting by good critics whom he had purposely assembled around him[73]—should have been so ridiculously bad as to disgust an impartial audience: next, it is still more improbable that a simple poetical failure, though doubtless mortifying to him, should work with such fearful effect as to plunge him into anguish and madness. To unnerve thus violently a person like Dionysius—deeply stained with the great crimes of unscrupulous ambition, but remarkably exempt from infirmities—some more powerful cause is required; and that cause stands out conspicuously, when we conceive the full circumstances of the Olympic festival of 384 B. C. He had accumulated for this occasion all the means of showing himself off, like Krœsus in his interview with Solon, as the most prosperous and powerful man in the Hellenic world;[74] means beyond the reach of any contemporary, and surpassing even Hiero or Thero of former days, whose praises in the odes of Pindar he probably had in his mind. He counted, probably with good reason, that his splendid legation, chariots, and outfit of acting and recitation for the poems, would surpass everything else seen on the holy plain; and he fully expected such reward as the public were always glad to bestow on rich men who exhausted their purses in the recognized vein of Hellenic pious ostentation. In this high wrought state of expectation, what does Dionysius hear, by his messengers returning from the festival? That their mission had proved a total failure, and even worse than a failure; that the display had called forth none of the usual admiration, not because there were rivals on the ground equal or superior, but simply because it came from him; that its very magnificence had operated to render the explosion of antipathy against him louder and more violent; that his tents in the sacred ground had been actually assailed, and that access to sacrifice, as well as to the matches, had been secured to him only by the interposition of authority. We learn indeed that his chariots failed in the field by unlucky accidents; but in the existing temper of the crowd, these very accidents would be seized as occasions for derisory cheering against him. To this we must add explosions of hatred, yet more furious, elicited by his poems, putting the reciters to utter shame. At the moment when Dionysius expected to hear the account of an unparalleled triumph, he is thus informed, not merely of disappointment, but of insults to himself, direct and personal, the most poignant ever offered by Greeks to a Greek, amidst the holiest and most frequented ceremony of the Hellenic world.[75] Never in any other case do we read of public antipathy, against an individual, being carried to the pitch of desecrating by violence the majesty of the Olympic festival.

[72] In a former chapter of this History (Vol. X. Ch. LXXVII. p. 75), I have already shown grounds, derived from the circumstances of Central Greece and Persia, for referring the discourse of Lysias, just noticed, to Olympiad 99 or 384 B. C. I here add certain additional reasons, derived from what is said about Dionysius, towards the same conclusion.

In xiv. 109, Diodorus describes the events of 388 B. C., the year of Olympiad 98, during which Dionysius was still engaged in war in Italy, besieging Rhegium. He says that Dionysius made unparalleled efforts to send a great display to this festival; a splendid legation, with richly decorated tents, several fine chariots-and-four, and poems to be recited by the best actors. He states that Lysias the orator delivered a strong invective against him, exciting those who heard it to exclude the Syracusan despot from sacrificing, and to plunder the rich tents. He then details how the purposes of Dionysius failed miserably on every point; the fine tents were assailed, the chariots all ran wrong or were broken, the poems were hissed, the ships returning to Syracuse were wrecked, etc. Yet in spite of this accumulation of misfortunes (he tells us) Dionysius was completely soothed by his flatterers (who told him that such envy always followed upon greatness), and did not desist from poetical efforts.

Again, in xv. 6, 7, Diodorus describes the events of 386 B. C. Here he again tells us, that Dionysius, persevering in his poetical occupations, composed verses which were very indifferent—that he was angry with and punished Philoxenus and others who criticized them freely—that he sent some of these compositions to be recited at the Olympic festival, with the best actors and reciters—that the poems, in spite of these advantages, were despised and derided by the Olympic audience—that Dionysius was distressed by this repulse, even to anguish and madness, and to the various severities and cruelties against his friends which have been already mentioned in my text.

Now upon this we must remark:—

1. The year 386 B. C. is not an Olympic year. Accordingly, the proceedings described by Diodorus in xv. 6, 7, all done by Dionysius after his hands were free from war, must be transferred to the next Olympic year, 384 B. C. The year in which Dionysius was so deeply stung by the events of Olympia, must therefore have been 384 B. C., or Olympiad 99 (relating to 388 B. C.).

2. Compare Diodor. xiv. 109 with xv. 7. In the first passage, Dionysius is represented as making the most prodigious efforts to display himself at Olympia in every way, by fine tents, chariots, poems, etc.—and also as having undergone the signal insult from the orator Lysias, with the most disgraceful failure in every way. Yet all this he is described to have borne with tolerable equanimity, being soothed by his flatterers. But, in xv. 7 (relating to 386 B. C., or more probably to 384 B. C.) he is represented as having merely failed in respect to the effect of his poems; nothing whatever being said about display of any other kind, nor about an harangue from Lysias, nor insult to the envoys or the tents. Yet the simple repulse of the poems is on this occasion affirmed to have thrown Dionysius into a paroxysm of sorrow and madness.

Now if the great and insulting treatment, which Diodorus refers to 388 B. C., could be borne patiently by Dionysius—how are we to believe that he was driven mad by the far less striking failure in 384 B. C.? Surely it stands to reason that the violent invective of Lysias and the profound humiliation of Dionysius, are parts of one and the same Olympic phænomenon; the former as cause, or an essential part of the cause—the latter as effect. The facts will then read consistently and in proper harmony. As they now appear in Diodorus, there is no rational explanation of the terrible suffering of Dionysius described in xv. 7; it appears like a comic exaggeration of reality.

3. Again, the prodigious efforts and outlay, which Diodorus affirms Dionysius to have made in 388 B. C. for display at the Olympic games—come just at the time when Dionysius, being in the middle of his Italian war, could hardly have had either leisure or funds to devote so much to the other purpose; whereas at the next Olympic festival, or 384 B. C., he was free from war, and had nothing to divert him from preparing with great efforts all the means of Olympic success.

It appears to me that the facts which Diodorus has stated are nearly all correct, but that he has misdated them, referring to 388 B. C., or Olymp. 98—what properly belongs to 384 B. C., or Olymp. 99. Very possibly Dionysius may have sent one or more chariots to run in the former of the two Olympiads; but his signal efforts, with his insulting failure brought about partly by Lysias, belong to the latter.

Dionysius of Halikarnassus, to whom we owe the citation from the oration of Lysias, does not specify to which of the Olympiads it belongs.

[73] Diodor. xv. 7. διὸ καὶ ποιήματα γράφειν ὑπεστήσατο μετὰ πολλῆς σπουδῆς, καὶ τοὺς ἐν τούτοις δόξαν ἔχοντας μετεπέμπετο, καὶ προτιμῶν αὐτοὺς συνδιέτριβε, καὶ τῶν ~ποιημάτων ἐπιστάτας καὶ διορθωτὰς εἶχεν~.

The Syracusan historian Athanis (or Athenis) had noticed some peculiar phrases which appeared in the verses of Dionysius: see Athenæus, iii. p. 98.

[74] Thucyd. vi. 16. Οἱ γὰρ Ἕλληνες καὶ ὑπὲρ δύναμιν μείζω ἡμῶν τὴν πόλιν ἐνόμισαν, τῷ ἐμῷ διαπρεπεῖ τῆς Ὀλυμπιάζε θεωρίας (speech of Alkibiadês).

[75] See a striking passage in the discourse called Archidamus (Or. vi. s. 111, 112) of Isokrates, in which the Spartans are made to feel keenly their altered position after the defeat of Leuktra: especially the insupportable pain of encountering, when they attended the Olympic festival, slights or disparagement from the spectators, embittered by open taunts from the reëstablished Messenians—instead of the honor and reverence which they had become accustomed to expect.

This may help us to form some estimate of the painful sentiment of Dionysius, when his envoys returned from the Olympic festival of 384 B. C.

Here then were the real and sufficient causes—not the mere ill-success of his poem—which penetrated the soul of Dionysius, driving him into anguish and temporary madness. Though he had silenced the Vox Populi at Syracuse, not all his mercenaries, ships, and forts in Ortygia, could save him from feeling its force, when thus emphatically poured forth against him by the free-spoken crowd at Olympia.

It was apparently shortly after the peace of 387 B. C., that Dionysius received at Syracuse the visit of the philosopher Plato.[76] The latter—having come to Sicily on a voyage of inquiry and curiosity, especially to see Mount Ætna—was introduced by his friends, the philosophers of Tarentum, to Dion, then a young man, resident at Syracuse, and brother of Aristomachê, the wife of Dionysius. Of Plato and Dion I shall speak more elsewhere: here I notice the philosopher only as illustrating the history and character of Dionysius. Dion, having been profoundly impressed with the conversation of Plato, prevailed upon Dionysius to invite and talk with him also. Plato discoursed eloquently upon justice and virtue, enforcing his doctrine that wicked men were inevitably miserable—that true happiness belonged only to the virtuous—and that despots could not lay claim to the merit of courage.[77] This meagre abstract does not at all enable us to follow the philosopher’s argument. But it is plain that he set forth his general views on social and political subjects with as much freedom and dignity of speech before Dionysius as before any simple citizen; and we are farther told, that the by-standers were greatly captivated by his manner and language. Not so the despot himself. After one or two repetitions of the like discourse, he became not merely averse to the doctrine, but hostile to the person, of Plato. According to the statement of Diodorus, he caused the philosopher to be seized, taken down to the Syracusan slave-market, and there put up for sale as a slave at the price of twenty minæ; which his friends subscribed to pay, and thus released him. According to Plutarch, Plato himself was anxious to depart, and was put by Dion aboard a trireme which was about to convey home the Lacedæmonian envoy Pollis. But Dionysius secretly entreated Pollis to cause him to be slain on the voyage—or at least to sell him as a slave. Plato was accordingly landed at Ægina, and there sold. He was purchased, or repurchased, by Annikeris of Kyrênê, and sent back to Athens. This latter is the more probable story of the two; but it seems to be a certain fact that Plato was really sold, and became for a moment a slave.[78]

[76] There are different statements about the precise year in which Plato was born: see Diogenes Laert. iii. 1-6. The accounts fluctuate between 429 and 428 B. C.; and Hermodorus (ap. Diog. L. iii. 6) appears to have put it in 427 B. C.: see Corsini, Fast. Attic. iii. p. 230; Ast. Platon’s Leben, p. 14.

Plato (Epistol. vii. p. 324) states himself to have been about (σχεδὸν) forty years of age when he visited Sicily for the first time. If we accept as the date of his birth 428 B. C., he would be forty years of age in 388 B. C.

It seems improbable that the conversation of Plato with Dion at Syracuse (which was continued sufficiently long to exercise a marked and permanent influence on the character of the latter), and his interviews with Dionysius, should have taken place while Dionysius was carrying on the Italian war or the siege of Rhegium. I think that the date of the interview must be placed after the capture of Rhegium in 387 B. C. And the expression of Plato (given in a letter written more than thirty years afterwards) about his own age, is not to be taken as excluding the supposition that he might have been forty-one or forty-two when he came to Syracuse.

Athenæus (xi. p. 507) mentions the visit of Plato.

[77] Plutarch, Dion. c. 5.

[78] Plutarch, Dion, c. 5; Diodor. xv. 7; Diogen. Laert. iii. 17; Cornelius Nepos, Dion, c. 2.

That Dionysius should listen to the discourse of Plato with repugnance, not less decided than that which the Emperor Napoleon was wont to show towards ideologists—was an event naturally to be expected. But that, not satisfied with dismissing the philosopher, he should seek to kill, maltreat, or disgrace him, illustrates forcibly the vindictive and irritable elements of his character, and shows how little he was likely to respect the lives of those who stood in his way as political opponents.

Dionysius was at the same time occupied with new constructions, military, civil, and religious, at Syracuse. He enlarged the fortifications of the city by adding a new line of wall, extending along the southern cliff of Epipolæ, from Euryalus to the suburb called Neapolis; which suburb was now, it would appear, surrounded by a separate wall of its own—or perhaps may have been so surrounded a few years earlier, though we know that it was unfortified and open during the attack of Imilkon in 396 B. C.[79] At the time, probably, the fort at the Euryalus was enlarged and completed to the point of grandeur which its present remains indicate. The whole slope of Epipolæ became thus bordered and protected by fortifications, from its base at Achradina to its apex at Euryalus. And Syracuse now comprised five separately fortified portions,—Epipolæ, Neapolis, Tychê, Achradina, and Ortygia; each portion having its own fortification, though the four first were included within the same outer walls. Syracuse thus became the largest fortified city in all Greece; larger even than Athens in its then existing state, though not so large as Athens had been during the Peloponnesian war, while the Phaleric wall was yet standing.

[79] Diodor. xiv. 6.3. It was in the construction of these extensive fortifications, seemingly, that Dionysius demolished the chapel which had been erected by the Syracusans in honor of Dioklês (Diodor. xiii. 635).

Serra di Falco (Antichità di Sicilia, vol. iv. p. 107) thinks that Dionysius constructed only the northern wall up the cliff of Epipolæ, not the southern. This latter (in his opinion) was not constructed until the time of Hiero II.

I dissent from him on this point. The passage here referred to in Diodorus affords to my mind sufficient evidence that the elder Dionysius constructed both the southern wall of Epipolæ and the fortification of Neapolis. The same conclusion moreover appears to result from what we read of the proceedings of Dion and Timoleon afterwards.

Besides these extensive fortifications, Dionysius also enlarged the docks and arsenals so as to provide accommodation for two hundred men of war. He constructed spacious gymnasia on the banks of the river Anapus, without the city walls; and he further decorated the city with various new temples in honor of different gods.[80]

[80] Diodor. xv. 13.

Such costly novelties added grandeur as well as security to Syracuse, and conferred imposing celebrity on the despot himself. They were dictated by the same aspirations as had prompted his ostentatious legation to Olympia in 384 B. C.; a legation of which the result had been so untoward and intolerable to his feelings. They were intended to console, and doubtless did in part console, the Syracusan people for the loss of their freedom. And they were further designed to serve as fuller preparations for the war against Carthage, which he was now bent upon renewing. He was obliged to look about for a pretext, since the Carthaginians had given him no just cause. But this, though an aggression, was a Pan-hellenic aggression,[81] calculated to win for him the sympathies of all Greeks, philosophers as well as the multitude. And as the war was begun in the year immediately succeeding the insult cast upon him at Olympia, we may ascribe it in part to a wish to perform exploits such as might rescue his name from the like opprobrium in future.

[81] See Plato, Epist. vii. p. 333, 336—also some striking lines, addressed by the poet Theokritus to Hiero II. despot at Syracuse in the succeeding century: Theokrit. xvi. 75-85.

Dionysius—ἐζήτει λαβεῖν πρόφασιν εὔλογον τοῦ πολέμου, etc.

The sum of fifteen hundred talents, recently pillaged from the temple at Agylla,[82] enabled Dionysius to fit out a large army for his projected war. Entering into intrigues with some of the disaffected dependencies of Carthage in Sicily, he encouraged them to revolt, and received them into his alliance. The Carthaginians sent envoys to remonstrate, but could obtain no redress; upon which they on their side prepared for war, accumulated a large force of hired foreign mercenaries under Magon, and contracted alliance with some of the Italiot Greeks hostile to Dionysius. Both parties distributed their forces so as to act partly in Sicily, partly in the adjoining peninsula of Italy; but the great stress of war fell on Sicily, where Dionysius and Magon both commanded in person. After several combats partial and indecisive, a general battle was joined at a place called Kabala. The contest was murderous, and the bravery great on both sides; but at length Dionysius gained a complete victory. Magon himself and ten thousand men of his army were slain; five thousand were made prisoners; while the remainder were driven to retreat to a neighboring eminence, strong, but destitute of water. They were forced to send envoys entreating peace; which Dionysius consented to grant, but only on condition that every Carthaginian should be immediately withdrawn from all the cities in the island, and that he should be reimbursed for the costs of the war.[83]

[82] Diodor. xv. 15.

[83] Diodor. xv. 15.

The Carthaginian generals affected to accept the terms offered, but stated (what was probably the truth), that they could not pledge themselves for the execution of such terms, without assent from the authorities at home. They solicited a truce of a few days, to enable them to send thither for instructions. Persuaded that they could not escape, Dionysius granted their request. Accounting the emancipation of Sicily from the Punic yoke to be already a fact accomplished, he triumphantly exalted himself on a pedestal higher even than that of Gelon. But this very confidence threw him off his guard and proved ruinous to him; as it happened frequently in Grecian military proceedings. The defeated Carthaginian army gradually recovered their spirits. In place of the slain general Magon, who was buried with magnificence, his son was named commander; a youth of extraordinary energy and ability, who so contrived to reassure and reorganize his troops, that when the truce expired, he was ready for a second battle. Probably the Syracusans were taken by surprise and not fully prepared. At least the fortune of Dionysius had fled. In this second action, fought at a spot called Kronium, he underwent a terrible and ruinous defeat. His brother Leptinês, who commanded on one wing, was slain gallantly fighting; those around him were defeated; while Dionysius himself, with his select troops on the other wing, had at first some advantage, but was at length beaten and driven back. The whole army fled in disorder to the camp, pursued with merciless vehemence by the Carthaginians, who, incensed by their previous defeat, neither gave quarter nor took prisoners. Fourteen thousand dead bodies, of the defeated Syracusan army, are said to have been picked up for burial; the rest were only preserved by night and by the shelter of their camp.[84]

[84] Diodor. xv. 16, 17.

Such was the signal victory—the salvation of the army, perhaps even of Carthage herself—gained at Kronium by the youthful son of Magon. Immediately after it, he retired to Panormus. His army probably had been too much enfeebled by the former defeat to undertake farther offensive operations; moreover he himself had as yet no regular appointment as general. The Carthaginian authorities too had the prudence to seize this favorable moment for making peace, and sent to Dionysius envoys with full powers. But Dionysius only obtained peace by large concessions; giving up to Carthage Selinus with its territory, as well as half the Agrigentine territory—all that lay to the west of the river Halykus; and farther covenanting to pay to Carthage the sum of one thousand talents.[85] To these unfavorable conditions Dionysius was constrained to subscribe; after having but a few days before required the Carthaginians to evacuate all Sicily, and pay the costs of the war. As it seems doubtful whether Dionysius would have so large a sum ready to pay down at once, we may reasonably presume that he would undertake to liquidate it by annual instalments. And we thus find confirmation of the memorable statement of Plato, that Dionysius became tributary to the Carthaginians.[86]

[85] Diodor. xv. 17.

[86] Plato, Epistol. vii. p. 333 A. After reciting the advice which Dion and he had given to Dionysius the younger, he proceeds to say—ἕτοιμον γὰρ εἶναι, τούτων γενομένων, πολὺ μᾶλλον δουλώσασθαι Καρχηδονίους τῆς ἐπὶ Γέλωνος αὐτοῖς γενομένης δουλείας, ~ἀλλ᾽ οὐχ, ὥσπερ νῦν τοὐναντίον, ὁ πατὴρ αὐτοῦ φόρον ἐτάξατο φέρειν τοῖς βαρβάροις~, etc.

Such are the painful gaps in Grecian history as it is transmitted to us, that we hear scarcely anything about Dionysius for thirteen years after the peace of 383-382 B. C. It seems that the Carthaginians (in 379 B. C.) sent an armament to the southern portion of Italy for the purpose of reëstablishing the town of Hipponium and its inhabitants.[87] But their attention appears to have been withdrawn from this enterprise by the recurrence of previous misfortunes—fearful pestilence, and revolt of their Libyan dependencies, which seriously threatened the safety of their city. Again, Dionysius also, during one of these years, undertook some operations, of which a faint echo reaches us, in this same Italian peninsula (now Calabria Ultra). He projected a line of wall across the narrowest portion or isthmus of the peninsula, from the Gulf of Skylletium to that of Hipponium, so as to separate the territory of Lokri from the northern portion of Italy, and secure it completely to his own control. Professedly the wall was destined to repel the incursions of the Lucanians; but in reality (we are told) Dionysius wished to cut off the connection between Lokri and the other Greeks in the Tarentine Gulf. These latter are said to have interposed from without, and prevented the execution of the scheme; but its natural difficulties would be in themselves no small impediment, nor are we sure that the wall was even begun.[88]

[87] Diodor. xv. 24.

[88] Strabo, vi. p. 261; Pliny, H. N. iii. 10. The latter calls the isthmus twenty miles broad, and says that Dionysius wished (intercisam) to cut it through: Strabo says that he proposed to wall it across (διατειχίζειν), which is more probable.

During this interval, momentous events (recounted in my previous chapters) had occurred in Central Greece. In 382 B. C., the Spartans made themselves by fraud masters of Thebes, and placed a permanent garrison in the Kadmeia. In 380 B. C., they put down the Olynthian confederacy, thus attaining the maximum of their power. But in 379 B. C., there occurred the revolution at Thebes achieved by the conspiracy of Pelopidas, who expelled the Lacedæmonians from the Kadmeia. Involved in a burdensome war against Thebes and Athens, together with other allies the Lacedæmonians gradually lost ground, and had become much reduced before the peace of 371 B. C., which left them to contend with Thebes alone. Then came the fatal battle of Leuktra which prostrated their military ascendency altogether. These incidents have been already related at large in former chapters. Two years before the battle of Leuktra, Dionysius sent to the aid of the Lacedæmonians at Korkyra a squadron of ten ships, all of which were captured by Iphikrates; about three years after the battle, when the Thebans and their allies were pressing Sparta in Peloponnesus, he twice sent thither a military force of Gauls and Iberians to reinforce her army. But his troops neither stayed long, nor rendered any very conspicuous service.[89]

[89] Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 2, 4, 33; vii i. 20-28. Diodor. xv. 70.

In this year we hear of a fresh attack by Dionysius against the Carthaginians. Observing that they had been lately much enfeebled by pestilence and by mutiny of their African subjects, he thought the opportunity favorable for trying to recover what the peace of 383 B. C., had obliged him to relinquish. A false pretence being readily found, he invaded the Carthaginian possessions in the west of Sicily with a large land force of thirty thousand foot, and three thousand horse; together with a fleet of three hundred sail, and store ships in proportion. After ravaging much of the open territory of the Carthaginians, he succeeded in mastering Selinus, Entella, and Eryx—and then laid siege to Lilybæum. This town, close to the western cape of Sicily,[90] appears to have arisen as a substitute for the neighboring town of Motyê (of which we hear little more since its capture by Dionysius in 396 B. C.), and to have become the principal Carthaginian station. He began to attack it by active siege and battering machines. But it was so numerously garrisoned, and so well defended, that he was forced to raise the siege and confine himself to blockade. His fleet kept the harbor guarded, so as to intercept supplies from Africa. Not long afterwards, however, he received intelligence that a fire had taken place in the port of Carthage whereby all her ships had been burnt. Being thus led to conceive that there was no longer any apprehension of naval attack from Carthage, he withdrew his fleet from continuous watch off Lilybæum; keeping one hundred and thirty men-of-war near at hand, in the harbor of Eryx, and sending the remainder home to Syracuse. Of this incautious proceeding the Carthaginians took speedy advantage. The conflagration in their port had been much overstated. There still remained to them two hundred ships of war, which, after being equipped in silence, sailed across in the night to Eryx. Appearing suddenly in the harbor, they attacked the Syracusan fleet completely by surprise; and succeeded, without serious resistance, in capturing and towing off nearly all of them. After so capital an advantage, Lilybæum became open to reinforcement and supplies by sea, so that Dionysius no longer thought it worth while to prosecute the blockade. On the approach of winter, both parties resumed the position which they had occupied before the recent movement.[91]

[90] Diodor. xxii. p. 304.

[91] Diodor. xv. 73; xvi. 5.

The despot had thus gained nothing by again taking up arms, nor were the Sicilian dependencies of the Carthaginians at all cut down below that which they acquired by the treaty of 383 B. C. But he received (about January or February 367 B. C.) news of a different species of success, which gave him hardly less satisfaction than a victory by land or sea. In the Lenæan festival of Athens, one of his tragedies had been rewarded with the first prize. A chorist who had been employed in the performance—eager to convey the first intelligence of this success to Syracuse and to obtain the recompense which would naturally await the messenger—hastened from Athens to Corinth, found a vessel just starting for Syracuse, and reached Syracuse by a straight course with the advantage of favorable winds. He was the first to communicate the news, and received the full reward of his diligence. Dionysius was overjoyed at the distinction conferred upon him; for though on former occasions he had obtained the second or third place in the Athenian competitions, he had never before been adjudged worthy of the first prize. Offering sacrifice to the gods for the good news, he invited his friends to a splendid banquet, wherein he indulged in an unusual measure of conviviality. But the joyous excitement, coupled with the effects of the wine, brought on an attack of fever, of which he shortly afterwards died, after a reign of thirty-eight years.[92]

[92] Diodor. xv. 74.

Thirty-eight years, of a career so full of effort, adventure, and danger, as that of Dionysius, must have left a constitution sufficiently exhausted to give way easily before acute disease. Throughout this long period he had never spared himself. He was a man of restless energy and activity, bodily as well as mental; always personally at the head of his troops in war—keeping a vigilant eye and a decisive hand upon all the details of his government at home—yet employing spare time (which Philip of Macedon was surprised that he could find[93]) in composing tragedies of his own, to compete for prizes fairly adjudged. His personal bravery was conspicuous, and he was twice severely wounded in leading his soldiers to assault. His effective skill as an ambitious politician—his military resource as a commander—and the long-sighted care with which he provided implements of offence as well as of defence before undertaking war,—are remarkable features in his character. The Roman Scipio Africanus was wont to single out Dionysius and Agathokles (the history of the latter begins about fifty years after the death of the former), both of them despots of Syracuse, as the two Greeks of greatest ability for action known to him—men who combined, in the most memorable degree, daring with sagacity.[94] This criticism, coming from an excellent judge, is borne out by the biography of both, so far as it comes to our knowledge. No other Greek can be pointed out, who, starting from a position humble and unpromising, raised himself to so lofty a pinnacle of dominion at home, achieved such striking military exploits abroad, and preserved his grandeur unimpaired throughout the whole of a long life. Dionysius boasted that he bequeathed to his son an empire fastened by adamantine chains;[95] so powerful was his mercenary force—so firm his position in Ortygia—so completely had the Syracusans been broken into subjection. There cannot be a better test of vigor and ability than the unexampled success with which Dionysius and Agathokles played the game of the despot, and to a certain extent that of the conqueror. Of the two, Dionysius was the most favored by fortune. Both indeed profited by one auxiliary accident, which distinguished Syracuse from other Grecian cities; the local speciality of Ortygia. That islet seemed expressly made to be garrisoned as a separate fortress,—apart from, as well as against, the rest of Syracuse,—having full command of the harbor, docks, naval force, and naval approach. But Dionysius had, besides, several peculiar interventions of the gods in his favor, sometimes at the most critical moments: such was the interpretation put by his enemies (and doubtless by his friends also) upon those repeated pestilences which smote the Carthaginian armies with a force far more deadly than the spear of the Syracusan hoplite. On four or five distinct occasions, during the life of Dionysius, we read of this unseen foe as destroying the Carthaginians both in Sicily and in Africa, but leaving the Syracusans untouched. Twice did it arrest the progress of Imilkon, when in the full career of victory; once, after the capture of Gela and Kamarina—a second time, when, after his great naval victory off Katana, he had brought his numerous host under the walls of Syracuse, and was actually master of the open suburb of Achradina. On both these occasions the pestilence made a complete revolution in the face of the war; exalting Dionysius from impending ruin, to assured safety in the one, and to unmeasured triumph in the other. We are bound to allow for this good fortune (the like of which never befel Agathokles), when we contemplate the long prosperity of Dionysius[96], and when we adopt, as in justice we must, the panegyric of Scipio Africanus.

[93] Plutarch, Timoleon, c. 15.

[94] Polyb. xv. 35. Διὸ καὶ Πόπλιον Σκιπίωνά φασι, τὸν πρῶτον καταπολεμήσαντα Καρχηδονίους, ἐρωτηθέντα, τίνας ὑπολαμβάνει πραγματικωτάτους ἄνδρας γεγονέναι καὶ σὺν νῷ τολμηροτάτους, εἰπεῖν, τοὺς περὶ Ἀγαθοκλέα καὶ Διονύσιον τοὺς Σικελιώτας.

[95] Plutarch, Dion, c. 7.

[96] The example of Dionysius—his long career of success and quiet death—is among those cited by Cotta in Cicero (De Nat. Deor. iii. 33, 81, 85) to refute the doctrine of Balbus, as to the providence of the gods and their moral government over human affairs.

The preceding chapter has detailed the means whereby Dionysius attained his prize, and kept it: those employed by Agathokles—analogous in spirit but of still darker coloring in the details—will appear hereafter. That Hermokrates—who had filled with credit the highest offices in the state and whom men had acquired the habit of following—should aspire to become despot, was no unusual phenomenon in Grecian politics; but that Dionysius should aim at mounting the same ladder, seemed absurd or even insane—to use the phrase of Isokrates.[97] If, then, in spite of such disadvantage he succeeded in fastening round his countrymen, accustomed to a free constitution as their birth-right, those “adamantine chains” which they were well known to abhor—we may be sure that his plan of proceeding must have been dexterously chosen, and prosecuted with consummate perseverance and audacity; but we may be also sure that it was nefarious in the extreme. The machinery of fraud whereby the people were to be cheated into a temporary submission, as a prelude to the machinery of force whereby such submission was to be perpetuated against their consent—was the stock in trade of Grecian usurpers. But seldom does it appear prefaced by more impudent calumnies, or worked out with a larger measure of violence and spoliation, than in the case of Dionysius. He was indeed powerfully seconded at the outset by the danger of Syracuse from the Carthaginian arms. But his scheme of usurpation, far from diminishing such danger, tended materially to increase it, by disuniting the city at so critical a moment. Dionysius achieved nothing in his first enterprise for the relief of Gela and Kamarina. He was forced to retire with as much disgrace as those previous generals whom he had so bitterly vituperated; and apparently even with greater disgrace—since there are strong grounds for believing that he entered into traitorous collusion with the Carthaginians. The salvation of Syracuse, at that moment of peril, arose not from the energy or ability of Dionysius, but from the opportune epidemic which disabled Imilkon in the midst of a victorious career.

[97] Isokratês, Or. v. (Philipp.) s. 73. Διονύσιος ... ἐπιθυμήσας μοναρχίας ~ἀλόγως καὶ μανικῶς~, καὶ τολμήσας ἅπαντα πράττειν τὰ φέροντα πρὸς τὴν δύναμιν ταύτην, etc.

Dionysius had not only talents to organize, and boldness to make good, a despotism more formidable than anything known to contemporary Greeks, but also systematic prudence to keep it unimpaired for thirty-eight years. He maintained carefully those two precautions which Thucydides specifies as the causes of permanence to the Athenian Hippias, under similar circumstances—intimidation over the citizens, and careful organization, with liberal pay among his mercenaries.[98] He was temperate in indulgencies; never led by any of his appetites into the commission of violence.[99] This abstinence contributed materially to prolong his life, since many a Grecian despot perished through desperate feelings of individual vengeance provoked by his outrages. With Dionysius, all other appetites were merged in the love of dominion, at home and abroad; and of money as a means of dominion. To the service of this master-passion all his energies were devoted, together with those vast military resources which an unscrupulous ability served both to accumulate and to recruit. How his treasury was supplied, with the large exigencies continually pressing upon it, we are but little informed. We know however that his exactions from the Syracusans were exorbitant;[100] that he did not hesitate to strip the holiest temples; and that he left behind him a great reputation for ingenious tricks in extracting money from his subjects.[101] Besides the large garrison of foreign mercenaries by whom his orders were enforced, he maintained a regular body of spies, seemingly of both sexes, disseminated among the body of the citizens.[102] The vast quarry-prison of Syracuse was his work.[103] Both the vague general picture, and the fragmentary details which come before us, of his conduct towards the Syracusans, present to us nothing but an oppressive and extortionate tyrant, by whose fiat numberless victims perished; more than ten thousand according to the general language of Plutarch.[104] He enriched largely his younger brothers and auxiliaries; among which latter, Hipparinus stood prominent, thus recovering a fortune equal to or larger than that which his profligacy had dissipated.[105] But we hear also of acts of Dionysius, indicating a jealous and cruel temper, even towards near relatives. And it appears certain that he trusted no one, not even them;[106] that though in the field he was a perfectly brave man, yet his suspicion and timorous anxiety as to every one who approached his person, were carried to the most tormenting excess, and extended even to his wives, his brothers, his daughters. Afraid to admit any one with a razor near to his face, he is said to have singed his own beard with a burning coal. Both his brother and his son were searched for concealed weapons, and even forced to change their clothes in the presence of his guards, before they were permitted to see him. An officer of the guards named Marsyas, having dreamt that he was assassinating Dionysius, was put to death for this dream, as proving that his waking thoughts must have been dwelling upon such a project. And it has already been mentioned that Dionysius put to death the mother of one of his wives, on suspicion that she had by incantations brought about the barrenness of the other—as well as the sons of a Lokrian citizen named Aristeides, who had refused, with indignant expressions, to grant to him his daughter in marriage.[107]

[98] Thucyd. vi. 55. ἀλλὰ καὶ διὰ τὸ πρότερον ξύνηθες, τοῖς μὲν πολίταις φοβερὸν, τοῖς δὲ ἐπικούροις ἀκριβὲς, πολλῷ τῷ περιόντι τοῦ ἀσφαλοῦς ἐκράτησε (Hippias).

On the liberality of the elder Dionysius to his mercenaries, see an allusion in Plato, Epistol. vii. p. 348 A.

The extension and improvement of engines for warlike purposes, under Dionysius, was noticed as a sort of epoch (Athenæus, De Machinis ap. Mathemat. Veteres, ed. Paris, p. 3).

[99] Cornelius Nepos, De Regibus, c. 2. “Dionysius prior, et manu fortis, et belli peritus fuit, et, id quod in tyranno non facile reperitur, minime libidinosus, non luxuriosus, non avarus, nullius rei denique cupidus, nisi singularis perpetuique imperii, ob eamque rem crudelis. Nam dum id studuit munire, nullius pepercit vitæ, quem ejus insidiatorem putaret.” To the same purpose Cicero, Tusc. Disp. v. 20.

[100] Aristotel. Politic. v. 9, 5.

[101] Pseudo-Aristotel. Œconomic. ii. c. 21, 42; Cicero, De Nat. Deorum, iii. 34, 83, 84; Valerius Maxim. i. 1.

[102] Plutarch, Dion, c. 28; Plutarch, De Curiositate, p. 523 A; Aristotel. Politic. v. 9, 3. The titles of these spies—αἱ ποταγωγίδες καλούμεναι—as we read in Aristotle; or οἱ ποταγωγεῖς—as we find in Plutarch—may perhaps both be correct.

[103] Cicero in Verrem, v. 55, 143.

[104] Plutarch, De Fortunâ Alexandr. Magni, p. 338 B. What were the crimes of Dionysius which Pausanias had read and describes by the general words Διονυσίου τὰ ἀνοσιώτατα—and which he accuses Philistus of having intentionally omitted in his history—we cannot now tell (Pausan. i. 13, 2: compare Plutarch, Dion, c. 36). An author named Amyntianus, contemporary with Pausanias, and among those perused by Photius (Codex 131), had composed parallel lives of Dionysius and the Emperor Domitian.

[105] Plato, Epistol. vii. p. 332 A; Aristotel. Politic. v. 5, 6.

[106] Plato, Epistol. vii. p. 332 D. Διονύσιος δὲ εἰς μίαν πόλιν ἀθροίσας πᾶσαν Σικελίαν ὑπὸ σοφίας, ~πιστεύων οὐδενὶ, μόγις ἐσώθη~, etc.

This brief, but significant expression of Plato, attests the excessive mistrust which haunted Dionysius, as a general fact; which is illustrated by the anecdotes of Cicero, Tuscul. Disput. v. 20, 23; and De Officiis, ii. 7; Plutarch, Dion, c. 9; Diodor. xiv. 2.

The well-known anecdote of Damoklês, and the sword which Dionysius caused to be suspended over his head by a horsehair, in the midst of the enjoyments of the banquet, as an illustration how little was the value of grandeur in the midst of terror—is recounted by Cicero.

[107] Plutarch, Dion, c. 3; Plutarch, Timoleon, c. 6.

Such were the conditions of existence—perpetual mistrust, danger even from the nearest kindred, enmity both to and from every dignified freeman, and reliance only on armed barbarians or liberated slaves—which beset almost every Grecian despot, and from which the greatest despot of his age enjoyed no exemption. Though philosophers emphatically insisted that such a man must be miserable,[108] yet Dionysius himself, as well as the great mass of admiring spectators, would probably feel that the necessities of his position were more than compensated by its awe-striking grandeur, and by the full satisfaction of ambitious dreams, subject indeed to poignant suffering when wounded in the tender point, and when reaping insult in place of admiration, at the memorable Olympic festival of 384 B. C., above-described. But the Syracusans, over whom he ruled, enjoyed no such compensation for that which they suffered from his tax-gatherers—from his garrison of Gauls, Iberians, and Campanians, in Ortygia—from his spies—his prison—and his executioners.

[108] This sentiment, pronounced by Plato, Isokratês, Cicero, Seneca, Plutarch, etc., is nowhere so forcibly laid out as in the dialogue of Xenophon called Hiero—of which indeed it forms the text and theme. Whoever reads this picture of the position of a Grecian τύραννος, will see that it was scarcely possible for a man so placed to be other than a cruel and oppressive ruler.

Nor did Syracuse suffer alone. The reign of the elder Dionysius was desolating for the Hellenic population generally, both of Sicily and Italy. Syracuse became a great fortress, with vast military power in the hands of its governor, “whose policy[109] it was to pack all Sicily into it;” while the remaining free Hellenic communities were degraded, enslaved, and half depopulated. On this topic, the mournful testimonies already cited from Lysias and Isokrates, are borne out by the letters of the eye-witness Plato. In his advice, given to the son and successor of Dionysius, Plato emphatically presses upon him two points: first, as to the Syracusans, to transform his inherited oppressive despotism into the rule of a king, governing gently and by fixed laws; next, to reconstitute and repeople, under free constitutions, the other Hellenic communities in Sicily, which at his accession had become nearly barbarised and half deserted.[110] The elder Dionysius had imported into Sicily large bodies of mercenaries, by means of whom he had gained his conquests, and for whom he had provided settlements at the cost of the subdued Hellenic cities. In Naxos, Katana, Leontini, and Messênê, the previous residents had been dispossessed and others substituted, out of Gallic and Iberian mercenaries. Communities thus transformed, with their former free citizens degraded into dependence or exile, not only ceased to be purely Hellenic, but also became far less populous and flourishing. In like manner Dionysius had suppressed, and absorbed into Syracuse and Lokri, the once autonomous Grecian communities of Rhegium, Hipponium, and Kaulonia, on the Italian side of the strait. In the inland regions of Italy, he had allied himself with the barbarous Lucanians; who, even without his aid, were gaining ground and pressing hard upon the Italiot Greeks on the coast.

[109] See the citation from Plato, in a note immediately preceding.

[110] Plato, Epistol. iii. p. 315 E. (to the younger Dionysius). Φασὶ δ᾽ οὐκ ὀλίγοι λέγειν σε πρός τινας τῶν παρά σε πρεσβευόντων, ὡς ἄρα σοῦ ποτὲ λέγοντος ἀκούσας ἐγὼ μέλλοντος ~τάς τε Ἑλληνίδας πόλεις ἐν Σικελίᾳ οἰκίζειν, καὶ Συρακουσίους ἐπικουφίσαι~, τὴν ἀρχὴν ἀντὶ τυραννίδος εἰς βασιλείαν μεταστήσαντα, ταῦτ᾽ ἄρα σὲ μέν τοτε διεκώλυσα, σοῦ σφόδρα προθυμουμένου, νῦν δὲ Δίωνα διδάσκοιμι δρᾷν αὐτὰ ταῦτα, καὶ τοῖς διανοήμασι τοῖς σοῖς τὴν σὴν ἀρχὴν ἀφαιρούμεθά σε.

Ibid. p. 319 C. Μή με διάβαλλε λέγων, ὡς οὐκ εἴων σε πόλεις Ἑλληνίδας ἐῤῥούσας ὑπὸ βαρβάρων οἰκίζειν, οὐδὲ Συρακουσίους ἐπικουφίσαι ... ~ὡς ἐγὼ μὲν ἐκέλευον, σὺ δ᾽ οὐκ ἤθελες πράττειν αὐτά~.

Again, see Epistol. vii. p. 331 F. 332 B. 334 D. 336 A.-D.—and the brief notice given by Photius (Codex, 93) of the lost historical works of Arrian, respecting Dion and Timoleon.

Epistol. viii. p. 357 A. (What Dion intended to do, had he not been prevented by death)—Καὶ μετὰ ταῦτα Σικελίαν ἂν τὴν ἄλλην κατῴκισα, ~τοὺς μὲν βαρβάρους ἣν νῦν ἔχουσιν ἀφελόμενος, ὅσοι μὴ ὑπὲρ τῆς κοινῆς ἐλευθερίας διεπολέμησαν πρὸς τὴν τυραννίδα, τοὺς δ᾽ ἔμπροσθεν οἰκητὰς τῶν Ἑλληνικῶν τόπων εἰς τὰς ἀρχαίας καὶ πατρῴας οἰκήσεις κατοικίσας~. Compare Plutarch, Timoleon, c. 2. αἱ δὲ πλεῖσται πόλεις ὑπὸ βαρβάρων μιγάδων καὶ στρατιωτῶν ἀμίσθων κατείχοντο.

The βάρβαροι to whom Plato alludes in this last passage, are not the Carthaginians (none of whom could be expected to come in and fight for the purpose of putting down the despotism at Syracuse), but the Campanian and other mercenaries provided for by the elder Dionysius on the lands of the extruded Greeks. These men would have the strongest interest in upholding the despotism, if the maintenance of their own properties was connected with it. Dion thought it prudent to conciliate this powerful force by promising confirmation of their properties to such of them as would act upon the side of freedom.

If we examine the results of the warfare carried on by Dionysius against the Carthaginians, from the commencement to the end of his career, we shall observe, that he began by losing Gela and Kamarina, and that the peace by which he was enabled to preserve Syracuse itself, arose, not from any success of his own, but from the pestilence which ruined his enemies; to say nothing about traitorous collusion with them, which I have already remarked to have been the probable price of their guarantee to his dominion. His war against the Carthaginians in 397 B. C., was undertaken with much vigor, recovered Gela, Kamarina, Agrigentum, and Selinus, and promised the most decisive success. But presently again the tide of fortune turned against him. He sustained capital defeats, and owed the safety of Syracuse, a second time, to nothing but the terrific pestilence which destroyed the army of Imilkon. A third time, in 383 B. C., Dionysius gratuitously renewed the war against Carthage. After brilliant success at first, he was again totally defeated, and forced to cede to Carthage all the territory west of the river Halykus, besides paying a tribute. So that the exact difference between the Sicilian territory of Carthage—as it stood at the beginning of his command and at the end of his reign—amounts to this: that at the earlier period it reached to the river Himera—at the later period only to the river Halykus. The intermediate space between the two comprehends Agrigentum with the greater part of its territory; which represents therefore the extent of Hellenic soil rescued by Dionysius from Carthaginian dominion.

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