United States or Rwanda ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
But the noble English bull-dogs, who, being but three in number, did not hesitate for one instant to rush upon the enormous lion at Warwick, will face any enemy in the world, and will come off victors, unless hyperbolically overweighted; a peril which need not be apprehended, except perhaps in Laconia or Messenia. Here, therefore, we should be disposed to leave the subject.
These adventures, and others equally romantic, I must leave to the genius of more credulous historians. All that seems to me worthy of belief is, that after stern but unavailing struggles, the Messenians abandoned Andania, and took their last desperate station at Ira, a mountain at whose feet flows the river Neda, separating Messenia from Triphylia.
Sparta required of Thebes to give up her power over the lesser cities of Bœotia, but Sparta herself did not give up Messenia and the other districts in the Peloponnesus, so that she still remained the strongest. This was called the peace of Antaleidas.
He was so unwilling to give up his nominal claim to Messenia, although he had practically lost that country, that instead of recovering it he very nearly lost Sparta as well, as he was out-manœuvred by Epameinondas. This happened in the following manner. The people of Mantinea revolted from the Thebans, and solicited aid from the Lacedæmonians.
In their distress they sent to consult the oracle at Delphi, and received the appalling answer that the salvation of Messenia required the sacrifice of a virgin of the royal house to the gods of the lower world. Aristodemus, who is the Messenian hero of the first war, slew his own daughter, which so disheartened the Spartans, that they abstained from attacking the Messenians for some years.
The news of his death filled all Achæa with lamentation and thirst for revenge. Messenia was ravaged with fire and sword till it submitted. Dinocrates and all who had voted for Philopoemen's death killed themselves to escape death by torture. All Achæa mourned at his funeral, statues were erected to his memory, and the highest honors decreed to him in many cities.
The Spartans had never abandoned their right to the province of Messenia, which had been wrested from them by Epaminondas; and since Thebes was no longer to be feared, they seem to have conceived hopes of regaining their lost power.
In truth, the whole Spartan system was hard and unfeeling, and much fitter to make fighting machines than men. The first great Spartan war that we know of was with their neighbours of Messenia, who stood out bravely, but were beaten, and brought down to the state of Helots in the year 723 B.C., all but a small band, who fled into other states.
On their return they were both tried for their lives, on the ground that whereas the law is that during the first month of the year, which they call Boukation, the Bœotarchs must lay down their office, they had held it for four additional months, during which they had been settling the affairs of Messenia, Laconia, and Arcadia.
But it was because of the success of the Thebans that they were so vexed, not reflecting on the power of Pelopidas's name, and how far it outweighed all their rhetoric in the estimation of one who always inclined to the stronger side. XXXI. On his return, Pelopidas was welcomed with no little gratitude because he had re-established Messenia, and obtained freedom for all other Greeks.
Word Of The Day