Outlines of Universal History, Designed as a Text-book and for Private Reading. George Park Fisher
dawn of day. In later times, a coin was put into the mouth of the corpse, with which to pay his passage to the world below. There was a funeral procession, and at the tomb a solemn farewell was addressed to the deceased by name. There was then a funeral-feast. Mourning garments were worn for a short period. The dead were buried in the suburbs of the cities, generally on both sides of a highway. In the tomb many little presents, as trinkets and vases, were deposited. (9) Courts of Law. At law men pleaded their own causes, but might take advice or have their speeches composed for them by others. In some cases, friends were allowed to speak in behalf of a litigant. Men like Demosthenes received large fees for services of this kind. There being no public prosecutor, informers were more numerous. They became odious under the name of sycophants, which is supposed to have been first applied to those who informed against breakers of an old law forbidding the exportation of figs from Athens.
CHAPTER IV. RELATIONS WITH PERSIA.—THE SPARTAN AND THEBAN HEGEMONY.
THE RETREAT OF THE TEN THOUSAND.—The Anabasis, the principal work of Xenophon, describes the retreat from the Tigris to the coast of Asia Minor, of a body of ten thousand mercenary Greek troops—a retreat effected under his own masterly leadership. The Persian Empire, now in a process of decay, was torn with civil strife. Xerxes and his eldest son had been murdered (465 B.C.). The story of several reigns which follow is full of tales of treason and fratricide. On the death of Darius II. (Darius Nothus) (423–404 B.C.), the younger Cyrus undertook to dethrone his brother Artaxerxes II., and for that purpose organized, in Asia Minor, a military expedition, made up largely of hired Greek troops. At Cunaxa, not far from Babylon, Cyrus fell in the combat with his brother. The Persians enticed the Greek generals to come into their camp, and slew them. Xenophon, an Athenian volunteer who had accompanied the army, conducted the retreat of his countrymen, with whom he encountered incredible hardships in the slow and toilsome journey through Armenia to Trapezus (Trebizond), and thence to Byzantium. The story of this march, through snow, over rugged mountains, and across rapid currents, is told in the Anabasis. A very striking passage is the description of the joy of the Greeks when from a hilltop they first descried the Black Sea. The soldiers shouted, "The sea! the sea!" and embraced one another and their officers.
THE CORINTHIAN WAR AND THE PEACE OF ANTALCIDAS.—Tissaphernes, the antagonist and successor of the younger Cyrus, was Persian governor in Asia Minor, and set out to bring under the yoke the Ionic cities which had espoused the cause of Cyrus. Sparta came to their aid, and King Agesilaus defeated the Persians near the Pactolus (395 B.C.). The Persians stirred up an enemy nearer home, by the use of gold, and the Boeotians, Corinthians, and Argives, jealous of Sparta, and resentful at the tyranny of her governors (harmosts), and joined by Athens, took up arms against the Lacedaemonians. Lysander fell in battle with the allies (395 B.C.). The course of the war in which Conon, the Athenian commander, destroyed the Spartan fleet at Cnidus, made it necessary to recall Agesilaus. His victory at Coronea (394 B.C.) did not avail to turn the tide in favor of Sparta. Conon rebuilt the long walls at Athens with the assistance of Persian money. The issue of the conflict was the Peace of Antalcidas with Persia (387 B.C.). The Grecian cities of Asia Minor were given up to the Persians, as were the islands of Clazomenae and Cyprus. With the exception of Lemnos, Imbros, and Scyros, which the Athenians were to control, all of the other states and islands were to be free and independent. This was a great concession to Persia. Greek union was broken up: each state was left to take care of itself as it best could. Antalcidas cared little for his country: his treaty was the natural result of Spartan aggressiveness and selfishness.
CONTEST OF THEBES AND SPARTA.—The Spartans had fallen away from the old rules of life ascribed to Lycurgus. They were possessed by a greed for gold. There were extremes of wealth and poverty among them. After the treaty of Antalcidas, they still lorded it over other states, and were bent on governing in Peloponnesus. At length they were involved in a contest with Thebes. This was caused by the seizure of the Cadmeia, the Theban citadel, by the Spartan Phoebidas acting in conjunction with an aristocratic party in Thebes (383 B.C.). The Theban democrats, who, under Pelopidas, made Athens their place of rendezvous, liberated Thebes, and expelled the Spartans from the Cadmeia. Hostile attempts of Sparta against Athens induced the Athenians to form a new confederacy (or symmachy) composed of seventy communities (378 B.C.); and, after they had gained repeated successes on the sea, the two states concluded peace. Athens had become alarmed at the increased power of Thebes, and was ready to go over to the side of Sparta, her old enemy. It was a feeling in favor of a balance of power like that which had prompted Sparta at the close of the Peloponnesian war, to refuse to consent to the destruction of Athens, which Thebes and Corinth had desired. Cleombrotus, king of Sparta, again invaded Boeotia. The principal Boeotian leader was Epaminondas, one of the noblest patriots in all Grecian history—in his disinterested spirit and self-government resembling Washington. The Spartan king was defeated by him in the great battle of Leuctra (371 B.C.), and was there slain. At this time the rage of party knew no bounds. The wholesale massacre of political antagonists in a city was no uncommon occurrence.
THEBAN HEGEMONY.—The victory of Leuctra gave the hegemony to Thebes. Three times the Boeotians invaded the Spartan territory. They founded Megalopolis in Arcadia, to strengthen the Arcadians against their Lacedæmonian assailants (370 B.C.). They also revived the Messenian power, recalled the Messenians who had long been in exile, and founded the city of Messene. In the battle of Mantinea (362 B.C.), Epaminondas, though victorious against the Spartans and their allies, was slain. Peace followed among the Grecian states, Sparta alone refusing to be a party to it. In the course of this intestine war, the Thebans had broken up the new maritime sway gained by them.
PERIOD III. THE MACEDONIAN ERA.
CHAPTER I. PHILIP AND ALEXANDER.
THE MACEDONIANS.—The Greeks, exhausted by long-continued war with one another, were just in a condition to fall under the dominion of Macedonia, the kingdom on the north which had been ambitious to extend its power. The Macedonians were a mixed race, partly Greek and partly Illyrian. Although they were not acknowledged to be Greeks, their kings claimed to be of Greek descent, and were allowed to take part in the Olympian games. At first an inland community, living in the country, rough and uncultivated, made up mostly of farmers and hunters, they had been growing more civilized by the efforts of their kings to introduce Greek customs. Archelaus (413–399 B.C.) had even attracted Greek artists and poets to his court. At the same time they were exerting themselves to extend their power to the sea. The people were hardy and brave. When Epaminondas died, Philip (359–336 B.C.) was on the Macedonian throne. He had lived three years at Thebes, and had learned much from Epaminondas, the best strategist and tactician of his day. The decline of public spirit in Greece had led the states to rely very much on mercenary troops, whose trade was war. Philip had a well-drilled standing army. Every thing was favorable to the gratification of his wish to make himself master of Greece. First he aimed to get possession of Greek cities in Chalcidice, of which Olynthus was the chief. The Athenians had towns in that region, besides Amphipolis, which was formerly theirs. Philip contrived to make the Olynthians his allies; and then, crossing the river Strymon, he conquered the western part of Thrace, where there were rich gold mines. There, for purposes of defense, he founded the city of Philippi.
THE SACRED WAR.—A pretext for interfering in the affairs of Greece, Philip found in the Sacred War in behalf of the temple of Delphi, which had been forced to loan money to the Phocians during a war waged by them against Thebes,