While Sparta separately had thus gained so much by the close of the
war, not one of her allies had received the smallest remuneration or
compensation, except such as might be considered to be involved in
the destruction of a formidable enemy. Even the pecuniary result
or residue which Lysander had brought home with him (four hundred
and seventy talents remaining out of the advances made by Cyrus),
together with the booty acquired at Dekeleia, was all detained by
the Lacedæmonians themselves. Thebes and Corinth indeed presented
demands, in which the other allies did not (probably durst not) join,
to be allowed to share. But though all the efforts and sufferings
of the war had fallen upon these allies no less than upon Sparta,
the demands were refused, and almost resented as insults.[389] Hence
there arose among the allies not merely a fear of the grasping
dominion, but a hatred of the monopolizing rapacity, of Sparta.
Of this new feeling, an early manifestation, alike glaring and
important, was made by the Thebans and Corinthians, when they refused
to join Pausanias in his march against Thrasybulus and the Athenian
exiles in Peiræus,[390]—less than a year after the surrender of
Athens, the enemy whom these two cities had hated with such extreme
bitterness down to the very moment of surrender. Even Arcadians and
Achæans too, habitually obedient as they were to Lacedæmon, keenly
felt the different way in which she treated them, as compared with
the previous years of war, when she had been forced to keep alive
their zeal against the common enemy.[391]
[389] Xenoph. Hellen. iii, 5, 5; Plutarch, Lysand. c. 27; Justin,
v, 10.
[390] Xen. Hellen. ii, 4, 30.
[391] Xen. Hellen. iii, 5, 12. Κορινθίους δὲ καὶ Ἄρκαδας καὶ
Ἀχαίους τί φῶμεν; οἱ ἐν μὲν τῷ πρὸς ὑμᾶς (it is the Theban
envoys who are addressing the public assembly at Athens) πολέμῳ
~μάλα λιπαρούμενοι ὑπ᾽ ἐκείνων~ (the Lacedæmonians), πάντων καὶ
πόνων καὶ κινδύνων καὶ δαπανημάτων μετεῖχον· ἐπεὶ δ᾽ ἔπραξαν
ἃ ἐβούλοντο οἱ Λακεδαιμόνιοι, ποίας ἢ ἀρχῆς ἢ τιμῆς ἢ ποίων
χρημάτων μεταδεδώκασιν αὐτοῖς; ἀλλὰ τοὺς μὲν εἱλώτας ἁρμοστὰς
καθιστάναι, τῶν δὲ ξυμμάχων ἐλευθέρων ὄντων, ἐπεὶ εὐτύχησαν,
δεσπόται ἀναπεφῄνασιν.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account