years of destitution and suffering which preceded as well as followed
the battle of Ægospotami, were well pleased to emigrate and find
husbands in that city;[47] while throughout the wide range of the
Lacedæmonian empire, the numerous victims exiled by the harmosts and
dekarchies had no other retreat on the whole so safe and tempting.
The extensive plain of Salamis afforded lands for many colonists. On
what conditions, indeed, they were admitted, we do not know; but the
conduct of Evagoras as a ruler, gave universal satisfaction.
[46] Isokrates, Or. ix, (Evag.) s. 59-61; compare Lysias, Or.
xix, (De Aristoph. Bon.) s. 38-46; and Diodor. xiv, 98.
[47] Isokrates, _l. c._ παιδοποιεῖσθαι δὲ τοὺς πλείστους αὐτῶν
γυναῖκας λαμβάνοντες παρ’ ἡμῶν, etc.
For the extreme distress of Athenian women during these trying
times consult the statement in Xenophon, Memorab. ii, 7, 2-4.
The Athenian Andokides is accused of having carried out a young
woman of citizen family,—his own cousin, and daughter of an
Athenian named Aristeides,—to Cyprus, and there to have sold
her to the despot of Kitium for a cargo of wheat. But being
threatened with prosecution for this act before the Athenian
Dikastery, he stole her away again and brought her back to
Athens; in which act, however, he was detected by the prince, and
punished with imprisonment from which he had the good fortune
to escape. (Plutarch, Vit. X, Orat. p. 834; Photius, Cod. 261;
Tzetzes, Chiliad. vi, 367).
How much there may be of truth in this accusation, we have no
means of determining. But it illustrates the way in which the
Athenian maidens, who had no dowry at home, were provided for by
their relatives elsewhere. Probably Andokides took this young
woman out, under the engagement to find a Grecian husband for her
in Cyprus. Instead of doing this, he sold her for his own profit
to the harem of the prince; or at least, is accused of having so
sold her.
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