[713] Herod. vi. 57, in enumerating the privileges and perquisites of the kings—δικάζειν δὲ μούνους τοὺς βασιλῆας τόσαδε μοῦνα· πατρούχου τε παρθένου πέρι, ἐς τὸν ἱκνέεται ἔχειν, ἢν μή περ ὁ πατὴρ αὐτὴν ἐγγυήσῃ· καὶ ὁδῶν δημοσιέων πέρι· καὶ ἤν τις θετὸν παῖδα ποιέεσθαι ἐθέλῃ, βασιλήων ἐνάντιον ποιέεσθαι.

It seems curious that πατρούχος πάρθενος should mean a damsel who has no father (literally, lucus a non lucendo): but I suppose that we must accept this upon the authority of Julius Pollux and Timæus. Proceeding on this interpretation, Valckenaer gives the meaning of the passage very justly: “Orbæ nuptias, necdum a patre desponsatæ, si plures sibi vindicarent, fieretque ἡ ἐπίκληρος, ut Athenis loquebantur, ἐπίδικος, Spartæ lis ista dirimebatur a regibus solis.”

Now the judicial function here described, is something very different from the language of Dr. Thirlwall, that “the kings had the disposal of the hand of orphan heiresses in cases where the father had not signified his will.” Such disposal would approach somewhat to that omnipotence which Aristophanês (Vesp. 585) makes old Philokleon claim for the Athenian dikasts (an exaggeration well calculated to serve the poet’s purpose of making the dikasts appear monsters of caprice and injustice), and would be analogous to the power which English kings enjoyed three centuries ago as feudal guardians over wards. But the language of Herodotus is inconsistent with the idea that the kings chose a husband for the orphan heiress. She was claimed, as of right, by persons in certain degrees of relationship to her. Whether the law about ἀγχίστεια, affinity carrying legal rights, was the same as at Athens, we cannot tell; but the question submitted for adjudication at Sparta, to the kings, and at Athens to the dikasteries, was certainly the same, agreeably to the above note of Valckenaer,—namely, to whom, among the various claimants for the marriage, the best legal title really belonged. It is, indeed, probable enough, that the two royal descendants of Hêraklês might abuse their judicial function, as there are various instances known in which they take bribes; but they were not likely to abuse it in favor of an unprovided youth.

Next, as to adoption: Herodotus tells us that the ceremony of adoption was performed before the kings: probably enough, there was some fee paid with it. But this affords no ground for presuming that they had any hand in determining whom the childless father was to adopt. According to the Attic law about adoption, there were conditions to be fulfilled, consents to be obtained, the absence of disqualifying circumstances verified, etc; and some authority before which this was to be done was indispensable (see Meier und Schömann, Attisch. Prozess, b. iii. ch. ii. p. 436). At Sparta, such authority was vested by ancient custom in the king: but we are not told, nor is it probable, “that he could interpose, in opposition to the wishes of individuals, to relieve poverty,” as Dr. Thirlwall supposes.

[714] Σπάρτα δαμασίμβροτος, Simonidês, apud Plutarch. Agesilaus, c. 1.

[715] Aristotel. Polit. ii. 6, 9, 19, 23. τὸ φιλότιμον—τὸ φιλοχρήματον.

[716] Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 12.

[717] Aristot. Polit. ii. 6, 22. Τοιγαροῦν ἐσῴζοντο μὲν πολεμοῦντες, ἀπώλοντο δὲ ἄρξαντες, etc. Compare also vii. 13, 15.

[718] Plutarch, Kleomen. c. 8; Phylarch. ap. Athenæ. vi. p. 271.

The strangers called Τρόφιμοι, and the illegitimate sons of Spartans, whom Xenophon mentions with eulogy, as “having partaken in the honorable training of the city,” must probably have been introduced in this same way, by private support from the rich (Xenoph. Hellen. v. 3, 9). The xenêlasy must have then become practically much relaxed, if not extinct.

[719] Strabo, viii. p. 362; Steph. Byz. Αἴθεια.

Construing the word πόλεις extensively, so as to include townships small as well as considerable, this estimate is probably inferior to the truth; since, even during the depressed times of modern Greece, a fraction of the ancient Laconia (including in that term Messenia) exhibited much more than one hundred bourgs.

In reference merely to the territory called La Magne, between Calamata in the Messenian gulf and Capo di Magna, the lower part of the peninsula of Tænarus, see a curious letter, addressed to the Duc de Nevers, in 1618, (on occasion of a projected movement to liberate the Morea from the Turks, and to insure to him the sovereignty of it, as descendant of the Palæologi,) by a confidential agent whom he despatched thither,—M. Chateaurenaud,—who sends to him “une sorte de tableau statistique du Magne, ou sont énumerés 125 bourgs ou villages renfermans 4,913 feux, et pouvans fournir 10,000 combattans, dont 4,000 armés, et 6,000 sans armes (between Calamata and Capo di Magna).” (Mémoires de l’Académie des Inscriptions, tom. xv. 1842, p. 329. Mémoire de M. Berger Xivrey.)

This estimate is not far removed from that of Colonel Leake, towards the beginning of the present century, who considers that there were then in Mani (the same territory) one hundred and thirty towns and villages; and this too in a state of society exceedingly disturbed and insecure,—where private feuds and private towers, or pyrghi, for defence, were universal, and in parts of which, Colonel Leake says, “I see men preparing the ground for cotton, with a dagger and pistols at their girdles. This, it seems, is the ordinary armor of the cultivator when there is no particular suspicion of danger: the shepherd is almost always armed with a musket.” ... “The Maniotes reckon their population at thirty thousand, and their muskets at ten thousand.” (Leake, Travels in Morea, vol. i. ch. vii. pp. 243, 263-266.)

Now, under the dominion of Sparta, all Laconia doubtless enjoyed complete internal security, so that the idea of the cultivator tilling his land in arms would be unheard of. Reasoning upon the basis of what has just been stated about the Maniote population and number of townships, one hundred πόλεις, for all Laconia, is a very moderate computation.

[720] Aristot. Λακων. Πολιτεία, ap. Schol. Pindar. Isthm. vii. 18.

I agree with M. Boeckh, that Pindar himself identifies this march of the Ægeids to Amyklæ with the original Herakleid conquest of Peloponnesus. (Notæ Criticæ ad Pindar. Pyth. v. 74, p. 479.)

[721] Pausan. iii. 2, 6; iii. 12, 7.

[722] Pausan. iii. 22, 5.

[723] Pausan. iii. 19, 5.

[724] Xenoph. Hellen. iv. 5, 11.

[725] Pausan. iii. 2, 7; iii. 20, 6. Strabo, viii. p. 363.

If it be true, as Pausanias states, that the Argeians aided Helus to resist, their assistance must probably have been given by sea; perhaps from Epidaurus Limêra, or Prasiæ, when they formed part of the Argeian federation.

[726] History of the Dorians, i. 7, 10 (note). It seems that Diodorus had given a history of the Messenian wars in considerable detail, if we may judge from a fragment of the last seventh book, containing the debate between Kleonnis and Aristomenês. Very probably it was taken from Ephorus,—though this we do not know.

For the statements of Pausanias respecting Myrôn and Rhianus, see iv. 6. Besides Myrôn and Rhianus, however, he seems to have received oral statements from contemporary Messenians and Lacedæmonians; at least on some occasions he states and contrasts the two contradictory stories (iv. 4, 4; iv. 5, 1).

[727] Pausan. iv. 27, 2-3: Diodor. xv. 77.

[728] See Diodor. Fragm. lib. viii. vol. iv. p. 30: in his brief summary of Messenian events (xv. 66), he represents it as a matter on which authors differed, whether Aristomenes belonged to the first or second war. Clemens Alexand. (Prot. p. 36) places him in the first, the same as Myrôn, by mentioning him as having killed Theopompus.

Wesseling observes (ad Diod. l. c.), “Duo fuerunt Aristomenes, uterque in Messeniorum contra Spartanos bello illustrissimus, alter posteriore, priore alter bello.”

Unless this duplication of homonymous persons can be shown to be probable, by some collateral evidence, I consider it only as tantamount to a confession, that the difficulty is insoluble.

Pausanias is reserved in his manner of giving judgment,—ὁ μέντοι Ἀριστομένης δόξῃ γε ἐμῇ γέγονεν ἐπὶ τοῦ πολέμου τοῦ ὑστέρου (iv. 6). Müller (Dorians, i. 7, 9) goes much too far when he affirms that the statement of Myrôn was “in the teeth of all tradition.” Müller states incorrectly the citation from Plutarch, Agis, c. 21 (see his Note h). Plutarch there says nothing about Tyrtæus: he says that the Messenians affirmed that their hero Aristomenês had killed the Spartan king Theopompus, whereas the Lacedæmonians said, that he had only wounded the king. According to both accounts, then, it would appear that Aristomenês belonged to the first Messenian war, not to the second.

[729] Tyrtæus, Fragm. 6, Gaisford. But Tyrtæus ought not to be understood to affirm distinctly (as Pausanias, Mr. Clinton, and Müller, all think) that Theopompus survived and put a close to the war: his language might consist with the supposition that Theopompus had been slain in the war,—Ὃν δία (Theopompus), Μεσσήνην εἴλομεν εὐρύχορον.

For we surely might be authorized in saying—“It was through Epameinondas that the Spartans were conquered and humbled; or it was through Lord Nelson that the French fleet was destroyed in the last war,” though both of them perished in the accomplishment.

Tyrtæus, therefore, does not contradict the assertion, that Theopompus was slain by Aristomenês, nor can he be cited as a witness to prove that Aristomenês did not live during the first Messenian war; which is the purpose for which Pausanias quotes him (iv. 6).

[730] Isokratês (Archidamus), Or. vi. pp. 121-122.

[731] Strabo (vi. p. 257) gives a similar account of the sacrilege and murderous conduct of the Messenian youth at the temple of Artemis Limnatis. His version, substantially agreeing with that of the Lacedæmonians, seems to be borrowed from Antiochus, the contemporary of Thucydidês, and is therefore earlier than the foundation of Messênê by Epameinondas, from which event the philo-Messenian statements take their rise. Antiochus, writing during the plenitude of Lacedæmonian power, would naturally look upon the Messenians as irretrievably prostrate, and the impiety here narrated would in his mind be the natural cause why the divine judgments overtook them. Ephorus gives a similar account (ap. Strabo. vi. p. 280).

Compare Herakleidês Ponticus (ad calcem Cragii De Rep. Laced. p. 528) and Justin, iii. 4.

The possession of this temple of Artemis Limnatis,—and of the Ager Dentheliates, the district in which it was situated,—was a subject of constant dispute between the Lacedæmonians and Messenians after the foundation of the city of Messênê, even down to the time of the Roman emperor Tiberius (Tacit. Annal. iv. 43). See Stephan. Byz. v. Δελθάνιοι; Pausan. iii. 2, 6; iv. 4, 2; iv. 31, 3. Strabo, viii. p. 362.

From the situation of the temple of Artemis Limnatis, and the description of the Ager Dentheliates, see Professor Ross, Reisen im Peloponnes, i. pp. 5-11. He discovered two boundary-stones with inscriptions, dating from the time of the early Roman emperors, marking the confines of Lacedæmon and Messênê; both on the line of the highest ridge of Taygetus, where the waters separate east and west, and considerably to the eastward of the temple of Artemis Limnatis, so that at that time the Ager Dentheliates was considered a part of Messenia.

I now find that Colonel Leake (Peloponnesiaca, p. 181) regards these Inscriptions, discovered by Professor Ross, as not proving that the temple of Artemis Limnatis was situated near the spot where they were found. His authority weighs much with me on such a point, though the arguments which he here employs do not seem to me conclusive.

[732] It is, perhaps, to this occasion that the story of the Epeunakti, in Theopompus, referred (ap. Athenæ. vi. p. 271),—Helots adopted into the sleeping-place of their masters, who had been slain in the war, and who were subsequently enfranchised.

The story of the Partheniæ, obscure and unintelligible as it is, belongs to the foundation of the colony of Taras, or Tarentum (Strabo, vi. p. 279).

[733] See Plutarch, De Superstitione, p. 168.

[734] See Pausan. iv. 6-14.

An elaborate discussion is to be seen in Manso’s Sparta, on the authorities whom Pausanias has followed in his History of the Messenian Wars, 18^te Beilage, tom. ii. p. 264.

“It would evidently be folly (he observes, p. 270), to suppose that in the history of the Messenian wars, as Pausanias lays them before us, we possess the true history of these events.”

[735] Tyrtæus, Fragm. 5, 6 (Schneidewin).

C. F. Hermann conceives the treatment of the Messenians after the first war, as mild, in comparison with what it became after the second (Lehrbuch der Griech. Staatsalterthümer, sect. 31), a supposition which the emphatic words of Tyrtæus render inadmissible.

[736] This is the express comparison introduced by Pausanias, iv. 5, 2.

[737] Plutarch, Sept. Sapient. Convivium, p. 159.

[738] Pausan. iv. 18, 4. Ἀριστομένην δὲ ἔς τε τὰ ἄλλα θεῶν τις, καὶ δὴ καὶ τότε ἐφύλασσεν.

Plutarch (De Herodot. Malignitat. p. 856) states that Herodotus had mentioned Aristomenês as having been made prisoner by the Lacedæmonians, but Plutarch must here have been deceived by his memory, for Herodotus does not mention Aristomenês.

[739] The narrative in Pausanias, iv. 15-24.

According to an incidental notice in Herodotus, the Samians affirmed that they had aided Lacedæmon in war against Messênê,—at what period we do not know (Herodot. iii. 56).

[740] Τοὺς δὲ Μεσσηνίους οἶδα αὐτὸς ἐπὶ ταῖς σπονδαῖς Ἀριστομένην Νικομηδους καλοῦντας (Pausan. ii. 14, 5). The practice still continued in his time.

Compare, also, Pausan. iv. 27, 3; iv. 32, 3-4.

[741] Pausanias heard the song himself (iv. 16, 4)—Ἐπέλεγον ᾆσμα τὸ καὶ ἐς ἡμᾶς ἔτι ᾀδόμενον:—

According to one story, the Lacedæmonians were said to have got possession of the person of Aristomenês, and killed him: they found in him a hairy heart (Steph. Byz. v. Ἀνδανία).

[742] Pausan. iv. 15, 1.

Perhaps Leotychides was king during the last revolt of the Helots, or Messenians, in 464 B. C., which is called the third Messenian war. He seems to have been then in exile, in consequence of his venality during the Thessalian expedition,—but not yet dead (Herodot. vi. 72). Of the reality of what Mr. Clinton calls the third Messenian war, in 490 B. C., I see no adequate proof (see Fast. Hell. vol. i. p. 257).

The poem of Rhianus was entitled Μεσσηνιακά. He also composed Θεσσαλικὰ, Ἠλιακὰ, Ἀχαϊκά. See the Fragments,—they are very few,—in Düntzer’s Collection, pp. 67-77.

He seems to have mentioned Nikoteleia, the mother of Aristomenês (Fr. ii. p. 73): compare Pausan. iv. 14, 5.

I may remark, that Pausanias, throughout his account of the second Messenian war, names king Anaxander as leading the Lacedæmonian troops; but he has no authority for so doing, as we see by iv. 15, 1. It is a pure calculation of his own, from the πατέρων πατέρες of Tyrtæus.

[743] Pausan. iv. 15, 3; Justin. iii, 5, 4. Compare Plato, Legg. ii. p. 630, Diodor. xv. 66; Lycurg. cont. Leokrat. p. 162. Philochorus and Kallisthenês also represented him as a native of Aphidnæ in Attica, which Strabo controverts upon slender grounds (viii. p. 362); Philochor. Fr. 56 (Didot).

[744] Plutarch, Theseus, c. 33; Pausan. i. 41, 5; Welcker, Alkman. Fragm. p. 20.

[745] Plutarch, Kleomen. c. 2. Ἀγαθὸς νέων ψυχὰς αἰκάλλειν.

[746] Philochorus, Frag. 56, ed. Didot; Lycurgus cont. Leokrat. p. 163.

[747] See Plutarch, De Musicâ, pp. 1134, 1142, 1146.

[748] Thucyd. v. 69; Xenoph. Rep. Laced. c. 13.

[749] See the treatise of Plutarch, De Musicâ, passim, especially c. 17, p. 1136, etc.; 33, p. 1143. Plato, Republ. iii. p. 399; Aristot. Polit. viii. 6, 5-8.

The excellent treatise De Metris Pindari, prefixed by M. Boeckh to his edition of Pindar, is full of instruction upon this as well as upon all other points connected with the Grecian music (see lib. iii. c. 8, p. 238).

[750] Aristot. Polit. v. 7, 1; Pausan. iv. 18, 2.

[751] Pausan. vi. 12, 2; Strabo viii. p. 355, where the Νέστορος ἀπόγονοι mean the Pylians of Tryphylia.

[752] Respecting the position of the Eleians and Pisatæ during the second Messenian war, there is confusion in the different statements: as they cannot all be reconciled, we are compelled to make a choice.

That the Eleians were allies of Sparta, and the Pisatans of Messenia, and that the contests of Sparta and Messenia were mixed up with those of Elis and Pisa about the agonothesia of the Olympic games, is conformable to one distinct statement of Strabo (viii. pp. 355, 358), and to the passage in Phavorinus v. Αὐγείας, and is, moreover, indirectly sustained by the view given in Pausanias respecting the relations between Elis and Pisa (vi. 22, 2), whereby it clearly appears that the agonothesia was a matter of standing dispute between the two, until the Pisatans were finally crushed by the Eleians in the time of Pyrrhus, son of Pantaleôn. Farther, this same view is really conformable to another passage in Strabo, which, as now printed, appears to contradict it, but which is recognized by Müller and others as needing correction, though the correction which they propose seems to me not the best. The passage (viii. p. 362) stands thus: Πλεονάκις δ᾽ ἐπολέμησαν (Messenians and Lacedæmonians) διὰ τὰς ἀποστάσεις τῶν Μεσσηνίων. Τὴν μὲν οὖν πρώτην κατάκτησιν αὐτῶν φησὶ Τυρταῖος ἐν τοῖς ποιήμασι κατὰ τοὺς τῶν πατέρων πατέρας γενέσθαι· τὴν δὲ δευτέραν, καθ᾽ ἣν ἑλόμενοι συμμάχους Ἠλείους καὶ Ἀργείους καὶ Πισατὰς ἀπέστησαν, Ἀρκάδων μὲν Ἀριστοκράτην τὸν Ὀρχομένου βασιλάα παρεχομένων στρατηγὸν, Πισατῶν δὲ Πανταλεόντα τὸν Ὀμφαλίωνος· ἡνίκα φησὶν αὐτὸς στρατηγῆσαι τὸν πόλεμον τοῖς Λακεδαιμονίοις, etc. Here it is obvious that, in the enumeration of allies, the Arcadians ought to have been included; accordingly, both O. Müller and Mr. Clinton (ad annum 672 B. C.) agree in altering the passage thus: they insert the words καὶ Ἄρκαδας after the word Ἠλείους, so that both Eleians and Pisatans appear as allies of Messenia at once. I submit that this is improbable in itself, and inconsistent with the passage of Strabo previously noticed: the proper way of altering the passage is, in my judgment, to substitute the word Ἄρκαδας in place of the word Ἠλείους, which makes the two passages of Strabo consistent with each other, and hardly does greater violence to the text.

As opposed to the view here adopted, there is, undoubtedly, the passage of Pausanias (iv. 15, 4) which numbers the Eleians among the allies of Messenia, and takes no notice of the Pisatæ. The affirmation of Julius Africanus (ap. Eusebium Chronic. i. p. 145, that the Pisatæ revolted from Elis in the 30th Olympiad, and celebrated the Olympic games themselves until Ol. 52, for twenty-two successive ceremonies) is in contradiction,—first, with Pausanias (vi. 22, 2), which appears to me a clear and valuable statement, from its particular reference to the three non-Olympiads,—secondly, with Pausanias (v. 9, 4), when the Eleians in the 50th Olympiad determine the number of Hellanodikæ. I agree with Corsini (Fasti Attici, t. iii. p. 47) in setting aside the passage of Julius Africanus: Mr. Clinton (F. H. p. 253) is displeased with Corsini for this suspicion, but he himself virtually does the same thing; for, in order to reconcile Jul. Africanus with Pansanias, he introduces a supposition quite different from what is asserted by either of them; i. e. a joint agonothesia by Eleians and Pisatans together. This hypothesis of Mr. Clinton appears to me gratuitous and inadmissible: Africanus himself meant to state something quite different, and I imagine him to have been misled by an erroneous authority. See Mr. Clinton, F. H. ad. ann. 660 B. C. to 580 B. C.

[753] Plutarch, De Serâ Num. Vind. p. 548; Pausan. iv. 15, 1; iv. 17, 3; iv. 23, 2.

The date of the second Messenian war, and the interval between the second and the first, are points respecting which also there is irreconcilable discrepancy of statement; we can only choose the most probable: see the passages collected and canvassed in O. Müller (Dorians, i. 7, 11, and in Mr. Clinton, Fast. Hellen. vol. i. Appendix 2, p. 257).

According to Pausanias, the second war lasted from B. C. 685-668, and there was an interval between the first and the second war of thirty-nine years. Justin (iii. 5) reckons an interval of eighty years; Eusebius, an interval of ninety years. The main evidence is the passage of Tyrtæus, wherein that poet, speaking during the second war, says, “The fathers of our fathers conquered Messênê.”

Mr. Clinton adheres very nearly to the view of Pausanias; he supposes that the real date is only six years lower (679-662). But I agree with Clavier (Histoire des Premiers Temps de la Grèce, t. ii. p. 233) and O. Müller (l. c.) in thinking that an interval of thirty-nine years is too short to suit the phrase of fathers’ fathers. Speaking in the present year (1846), it would not be held proper to say, “The fathers of our fathers carried on the war between 1793 and the peace of Amiens:” we should rather say, “The fathers of our fathers carried on the American war and the Seven Years’ war.” An age is marked by its mature and even elderly members,—by those between thirty-five and fifty-five years of age.

Agreeing as I do here with O. Müller, against Mr. Clinton, I also agree with him in thinking that the best mark which we possess of the date of the second Messenian war is the statement respecting Pantaleôn: the 34th Olympiad, which Pantaleôn celebrated, probably fell within the time of the war; which would thus be brought down much later than the time assigned by Pausanias, yet not so far down as that named by Eusebius and Justin: the exact year of its commencement, however, we have no means of fixing.

Krebs, in his discussions on the Fragments of the lost Books of Diodorus, thinks that that historian placed the beginning of the second Messenian war in the 35th Olympiad (B. C. 640) (Krebs, Lectiones Diodoreæ, pp. 254-260).

[754] Diodor. xv. 66; Polyb. iv. 33, who quotes Kallisthenês; Paus. viii. 5, 8. Neither the Inscription, as cited by Polybius, nor the allusion in Plutarch (De Serâ Numin. Vindictâ, p. 548), appear to fit the narrative of Pausanias, for both of them imply secret and long-concealed treason, tardily brought to light by the interposition of the gods; whereas, Pausanias describes the treason of Aristokratês, at the battle of the Trench, as palpable and flagrant.

[755] Herakleid. Pontic. ap. Diog. Laërt. i. 94.

[756] Pausan. iv. 24, 2; iv. 34, 6; iv. 35, 2.

[757] Thucyd. i. 101.

[758] Pausanias says, τὴν μὲν ἄλλην Μεσσηνίαν, πλὴν τῆς Ἀσιναίων, αὐτοὶ διελάγχανον, etc. (iv. 24, 2.)

In an apophthegm ascribed to king Polydorus, leader of the Spartans during the first Messenian war, he is asked, whether he is really taking arms against his brethren, to which he replies, “No; I am only marching to the unallotted portion of the territory.” (Plutarch, Apophthegm. Lakonic. p. 231.)—ἐπὶ τὴν ἀκλήρωτον χώραν.

[759] Pausan. vi. 22, 2; v. 6, 3; v. 10, 2; Strabo, viii. pp. 355-357.

The temple in honor of Zeus at Olympia, was first erected by the Eleians, out of the spoils of this expedition (Pausan. v. 10, 2).

[760] Thucyd. v. 31. Even Lepreum is characterized as Eleian, however (Aristoph. Aves, 149): compare also Steph. Byz. v. Τριφυλία, ἡ Ἦλις.

Even in the 6th Olympiad, an inhabitant of Dyspontium is proclaimed as victor at the stadium, under the denomination of “an Eleian from Dyspontium;” proclaimed by the Eleians of course,—the like in the 27th Olympiad: see Stephan. Byz. v. Δυσπόντιον which shows that the inhabitants of the Pisatid cannot have rendered themselves independent of Elis in the 26th Olympiad, as Strabo alleges (viii. p. 355).

[761] Herodot. iv. 149; Strabo, viii. p. 343.

[762] Diodor. xiv. 17; xv. 77; Xenoph. Hellen. iii. 2, 23, 26.

It was about this period, probably, that the idea of the local eponymous, Triphylus, son of Arkas, was first introduced (Polyb. iv. 77).

[763] Hermippus ap. Athenæ. i. p. 27. Ἀνδράποδ᾽ ἐκ Φρυγίας, απὸ δ᾽ Ἀρκαδίας ἐπικούρους. Also, Xenoph. Hellen. vii. 1, 23. πλεῖστον δὲ φῦλον τῶν Ἑλληνικῶν τὸ Ἀρκαδικὸν εἴη, etc.

[764] Pausan. viii. 6, 7; viii. 37, 6; viii. 38, 2. Xenias, one of the generals of Greek mercenaries in the service of Cyrus the younger, a native of the Parrhasian district in Arcadia, celebrates with great solemnity, during the march upward, the festival and games of the Lykæa (Xenoph. Anabas. i. 2 10; compare Pindar, Olymp. ix. 142).

Many of the forests in Arcadia contained not only wild boars, but bears, in the days of Pausanias (viii. 23, 4).

[765] Pausan. viii. 26, 5; Strabo, viii. p. 388.

Some geographers distributed the Arcadians into three subdivisions, Azanes, Parrhasii, and Trapezuntii. Azan passed for the son of Arcas, and his lot in the division of the paternal inheritance was said to have contained seventeen towns (ἃς ἔλαχεν Ἀζήν). Stephan. Byz. v. Ἀζανία—Παῤῥασία. Kleitôr seems the chief place in Azania, as far as we can infer from genealogy (Pausan. viii. 4, 2, 3). Pæus, or Päos, from whence the Azanian suitor of the daughter of Kleisthenês presented himself, was between Kleitôr and Psôphis (Herod. vi. 127; Paus. viii. 23, 6). A Delphian oracle, however, reckons the inhabitants of Phigaleia, in the south-western corner of Arcadia, among the Azanes (Paus. viii. 42, 3).

The burial-place of Areas was supposed to be on Mount Mænalus (Paus. viii. 9, 2).

[766] Thucyd. v. 65. Compare the description of the ground in Professor Ross (Reisen im Peloponnes. iv. 7).

[767] Strabo. viii. p. 337.

[768] Herodot. ix. 27.

[769] Strabo, 1. c. Mantineia is reckoned among the oldest cities of Arcadia (Polyb. ii. 54). Both Mantineia and Orchomenus had originally occupied very lofty hill-sites, and had been rebuilt on a larger scale, lower down, nearer to the plain (Pausan. viii. 8, 3; 12, 4; 13, 2).

In regard to the relations, during the early historical period, between Sparta, Argos, and Arcadia, there is a new fragment of Diodorus (among those recently published by Didot out of the Excerpta in the Escurial library, Fragment. Historic. Græcor. vol. ii. p. viii.). The Argeians had espoused the cause of the Arcadians against Sparta; and at the expense of considerable loss and suffering, had regained such portions of Arcadia as she had conquered. The king of Argos restored this recovered territory to the Arcadians: but the Argeians generally were angry that he did not retain it and distribute it among them as a reward for their losses in the contest. They rose in insurrection against the king, who was forced to flee, and take refuge at Tegea.

We have nothing to illustrate this fragment, nor do we know to what king, date, or events, it relates.

[770] Μαιναλίη δυσχείμερος (Delphian Oracle, ap. Paus. viii. 9, 2).

[771] Xenophon, in describing the ardor with which Epameinondas inspired his soldiers before this final battle, says (vii. 5, 20), προθύμως μὲν ἐλευκοῦντο οἱ ἱππεῖς τὰ κράνη, κελεύοντος ἐκείνου· ἐπεγράφοντο δὲ καὶ τῶν Ἀρκάδων ὁπλῖται, ῥόπαλα ἔχοντες, ὡς Θηβαῖοι ὄντες· πάντες δὲ ἠκονῶντο καὶ λόγχας καὶ μαχαίρας, καὶ ἐλαμπρύνοντο τὰς ἀσπίδας.

It is hardly conceivable that these Arcadian clubmen should have possessed a shield and a full panoply. The language of Xenophon in calling them hoplites, and the term ἐπεγράφοντο, properly referring to the inscription on the shield, appear to be conceived in a spirit of contemptuous sneering, proceeding from Xenophon’s miso-Theban tendencies: “The Arcadian hoplites, with their clubs, put themselves forward to be as good as the Thebans.” That these tendencies of Xenophon show themselves in expressions very unbecoming to the dignity of history (though curious as evidences of the time), may be seen by vii. 5, 12, where he says of the Thebans,—ἐνταῦθα δὴ οἱ πῦρ πνέοντες, οἱ νενικηκότες τοὺς Λακεδαιμονίους, οἱ τῷ παντὶ πλέονες, etc.

[772] Thucyd. v. 33, 47, 81.

[773] Thucyd. 1. c. Compare the instructive speech of Kleigenês, the envoy from Akanthus, addressed to the Lacedæmonians, B. C. 382 (Xen. Hellen. v. 2, 15-16).

[774] Xenoph. Hellen. v. 2, 1-6; Diodor. xv. 19.

[775] Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 5, 10-11; vii. 1, 23-25.

[776] Pausan. viii. 27, 5. No œkist is mentioned from Orchomenus, though three of the petty townships contributing (συντελοῦντα) to Orchomenus were embodied in the new city. The feud between the neighboring cities of Orchomenus and Mantineia was bitter (Xen. Hellen. vi. 5, 11-22). Orchomenus and Hêræa both opposed the political confederation of Arcadia.

The oration of Demosthenês, ὑπὲρ Μεγαλοπολιτῶν, strongly attests the importance of this city, especially c. 10,—ἐὰν μὲν ἀναιρεθῶσι καὶ διοικισθῶσιν, ἰσχυροῖς Λακεδαιμονίοις εὐθύς ἐστιν εἶναι, etc.

[777] Pausan. iii. 2, 6; iii. 7, 3; viii. 48, 3.

[778] Pausan. viii. 39, 2.

[779] Alkman, Fr. 15, Welcker; Strabo, x. p. 446.

[780] That the Skiritæ were Arcadians is well known (Thuc. v. 47; Steph. Byz. v. Σκίρος); the possession of Belemina was disputed with Sparta, in the days of her comparative humiliation, by the Arcadians: see Plutarch, Kleomenês, 4; Pausan. viii. 35, 4.

Respecting Karyæ (the border town of Sparta, where the διαβατήρια were sacrificed, Thuc. v. 55), see Photius Καρυάτεια—ἑορτὴ Ἀρτέμιδος· τὰς δὲ Καρύας Ἀρκάδων οὔσας ἀπετέμοντο Λακεδαιμόνιοι.

The readiness with which Karyæ and the Maleates revolted against Sparta after the battle of Leuktra, even before the invasion of Laconia by the Thebans, exhibits them apparently as conquered foreign dependencies of Sparta, without any kindred of race (Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 5, 24-26; vii. 1, 28). Leuktron, in the Maleatis, seems to have formed a part of the territory of Megalopolis in the days of Kleomenês the Third (Plutarch, Kleomenês, 6); in the Peloponnesian war it was the frontier town of Sparta towards Mount Lykæum (Thuc. v. 53).

[781] Herod. i. 66. καταφρονήσαντες Ἀρκάδων κρέσσονες εἶναι, ἐχρηστηριάζοντο ἐν Δέλφοισι ἐπὶ πάσῃ τῇ Ἀρκάδων χωρῇ.

[782] Herod. i. 67; Pausan. iii. 3, 5; vii. 45, 2.

Herodotus saw the identical chains suspended in the temple of Athênê Alea at Tegea.

[783] Herod. i. 69-70.

[784] Herod. ix. 26.

[785] Xenoph. Hellen. v. 2, 19. Ὥσπερ Ἀρκάδες, ὅταν μεθ᾽ ὑμῶν ἴωσι, τά τε αὑτῶν σώζουσι καὶ τὰ ἀλλότρια ἁρπάζουσι, etc.

This was said to the Lacedæmonians about ten years before the battle of Leuktra.