The Historians' History of the World 04

Most of the principal officers, and many inferior men, of the numerous Asiatic troops under Agesilaus, would be deeply interested in this revolution. The principal sources of pay for all would cease; and hence the plain of Coronea seems to have been the last field of fame for the Cyreans. We find no mention of them afterwards from Xenophon: apparent proof that their following fortunes were not brilliant; not such as he could have any satisfaction in reporting. Probably they dispersed, some to their homes, some to seek new service, and never more assembled.b

LAND AFFAIRS OF THE CORINTHIAN WAR

[394-392 B.C.]

Xenophon was no such student of the accurate arrangement of events as was Thucydides, and the history recounted hereafter is differently ordered by different historians; by some the massacre at Corinth is postponed two years, to 392 B.C. The massacre which Xenophon with his Spartan sympathies makes so cold-blooded a butchery is by sober historians credited merely to the government’s anticipation of a similar step on the part of the opposition.a

Corinth still continued to be the theatre of war. A Lacedæmonian garrison occupied Sicyon, and made frequent inroads into the Corinthian territory. The allies of Corinth were well pleased to see themselves thus exempt from the calamities of war at her expense. But the party among the Corinthians which, on political grounds, desired to renew their connection with Sparta, derived new motives from this state of things to encourage them in their designs; and they began to hold private meetings to concert measures for restoring peace. Their movements were observed by their adversaries, who determined to counteract them by one of those atrocious massacres which so frequently disfigure the pages of Greek history. We do not know what credit may be due to Xenophon, when he intimates that all the principal allies of Corinth,—the Argives, and Bœotians, and Athenians,—had an equal share in the conspiracy, or whether he is only speaking of the foreign garrison. His horror is chiefly excited by the impiety of the murderers, who selected a holiday for the deed, that they might be the more likely to find their enemies out of doors, and in the execution of their purpose paid no regard to the most sacred things and places, but stained even the altars and images of the gods with the blood of their victims.

Unhappily this was no new excess of party rage: but perhaps few scenes of this kind had been planned with more ferocious coolness, or accompanied with a greater number of shocking circumstances; though it must not be forgotten that it is Xenophon who describes it. Suspicions however had been previously entertained of the plot by Pasimelus, one of the persecuted party, and at the time of the tumult a body of the younger citizens was assembled with him in a place of exercise outside the walls. They immediately ran up to seize the Acrocorinthus, where they maintained themselves for a time against the attacks of their enemies. But an unpropitious omen, probably strengthening the consciousness of their weakness, made them resolve to withdraw, and to seek safety in exile. Yet, notwithstanding the impious treachery of their enemies, they were induced by the persuasions of their friends and relatives, and by the oaths of the leading men of the opposite party, to abandon this intention, and return to their homes.

But their fears for their personal safety had no sooner subsided, than the state of public affairs again began to appear insupportable, and they were ready to run any risk for the sake of a change. The opposite party had gone so far in their enmity to Sparta, or in their zeal for democracy, as to do their utmost towards establishing a complete unity, both of civil rights and of territory, between Corinth and Argos. The land-marks which separated the two states had been removed; so that the name either of Corinth or of Argos might be applied to the whole. But since it was Argive influence that had brought about this union, since the Argive institutions had been adopted, and the Argive franchise communicated to the Corinthians, the discontented had some reason to complain, that Corinth had lost her independence and dignity, while Argos had gained an increase of territory by the transaction. But what they bore still more impatiently, was the loss of their own rank and influence, which were totally extinguished by the union; they no longer enjoyed any exclusive privileges, any rights which they did not share with the whole Argive-Corinthian commonalty; and this was a franchise which they valued no more than the condition of an alien. They therefore resolved on a desperate effort for restoring Corinth to her former station in Greece, and for recovering their own station in Corinth.

[392 B.C.]