We see thus that the claim now advanced by Philomelus was not fictitious, but genuine, and felt by himself as well as by other Phokians to be the recovery of an ancient privilege, lost only through superior force.[520] His views being heartily embraced by his countrymen, he was nominated general with full powers. It was his first measure to go to Sparta, upon whose aid he counted, in consequence of the heavy fine which still stood imposed upon her by the Amphiktyonic sentence. He explained his views privately to king Archidamus, engaging, if the Phokians should become masters of the temple, to erase the sentence and fine from the column of record. Archidamus did not dare to promise him public countenance or support; the rather, as Sparta had always been the chief supporter of the Delphian presidency (as against the Phokian) over the temple. But in secret he warmly encouraged the scheme; furnishing a sum of fifteen talents, besides a few mercenary soldiers, towards its execution. With this aid Philomelus returned home, provided an equal sum of fifteen talents from his own purse, and collected a body of peltasts, Phokians as well as strangers. He then executed his design against Delphi, attacking suddenly both the town and the temple, and capturing them, as it would appear, with little opposition. To the alarmed Delphians, generally, he promised security and good treatment; but he put to death the members of the Gens (or Clan) called Thrakidæ, and seized their property: these men constituted one among several holy Gentes, leading conductors of the political and religious agency of the place.[521] It is probable, that when thus suddenly assailed, they had sent to solicit aid from their neighbors, the Lokrians of Amphissa; for Philomelus was scarcely in possession of Delphi, when these latter marched up to the rescue. He defeated them however with serious loss, and compelled them to return home. [520] Justin (viii. 1) takes no notice of this first position of the Phokians in regard to the temple of Delphi. He treats them as if they had been despoilers of the temple even at first; “velut deo irascentes.” [521] Diodor. xvi. 24. Hesychius (v. Λαφριάδαι) mentions another phratry or gens at Delphi, called Laphriadæ. See Wilhelm Götte, Das Delphische Orakel, p. 83. Leipsic, 1839. It is stated by Pausanias, that the Phokians were bent upon dealing with Delphi and its inhabitants in the harshest manner; intending to kill all the men of military age, to sell the remaining population as slaves, and to raze the whole town to the ground. Archidamus, king of Sparta, (according to Pausanias) induced the Phokians to abandon this resolution (Pausan. iii. 10, 4). At what moment the Phokians ever determined on this step—or, indeed, whether they ever really determined on it—we cannot feel any certainty. Nor can we decide confidently, whether Pausanias borrowed the statement from Theopompus, whom he quotes a little before.