It was in one of the three years between 420-416 B.C., though we do not know in which, that the vote of ostracism took place, arising out of the contention between Nikias and Alkibiadês.[156] The political antipathy between the two having reached a point of great violence, it was proposed that a vote of ostracism should be taken, and this proposition—probably made by the partisans of Nikias, since Alkibiadês was the person most likely to be reputed dangerous—was adopted by the people. Hyperbolus the lamp-maker, son of Cheremês, a speaker of considerable influence in the public assembly, strenuously supported it, hating Nikias not less than Alkibiadês. Hyperbolus is named by Aristophanês as having succeeded Kleon in the mastership of the rostrum in the Pnyx:[157] if this were true, his supposed demagogic preëminence would commence about September 422 B.C., the period of the death of Kleon. Long before that time, however, he had been among the chief butts of the comic authors, who ascribe to him the same baseness, dishonesty, impudence, and malignity in accusation, as that which they fasten upon Kleon, though in language which seems to imply an inferior idea of his power. And it may be doubted whether Hyperbolus ever succeeded to the same influence as had been enjoyed by Kleon, when we observe that Thucydidês does not name him in any of the important debates which took place at and after the Peace of Nikias. Thucydidês only mentions him once, in 411 B.C., while he was in banishment under sentence of ostracism, and resident at Samos. He terms him, “one Hyperbolus, a low busy-body, who had been ostracized, not from fear of dangerous excess of dignity and power, but through his wickedness and his being felt as a disgrace to the city.”[158] This sentence of Thucydidês is really the only evidence against Hyperbolus: for it is not less unjust in his case than in that of Kleon to cite the jests and libels of comedy as if they were so much authentic fact and trustworthy criticism. It was at Samos that Hyperbolus was slain by the oligarchical conspirators who were aiming to overthrow the democracy at Athens. We have no particular facts respecting him to enable us to test the general character given by Thucydidês. [156] Dr. Thirlwall (History of Greece, vol. iii, ch. xxiv, p. 360) places this vote of ostracism in midwinter or early spring of 415 B.C., immediately before the Sicilian expedition. His grounds for this opinion are derived from the Oration called Andokidês against Alkibiadês, the genuineness of which he seems to accept (see his Appendix ii, on that subject, vol. iii, p. 494, _seq._).