United States or Cameroon ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
He himself took up a position in the chief pass, and commanded the Aetolians to occupy the mountain-path, by which Xerxes had formerly succeeded in turning the Spartans.
As soon as the Athenians had secured shelter for their families, they began to restore the mighty walls which had been the pride of their city. When the Spartans heard of this, they jealously objected, for they were afraid that Athens would become more powerful than Sparta.
His design in sending Lacedaemonius out, against his will, and with so few ships, was that if he performed nothing brilliant he might be accused, even more than he was already, of leaning to the side of the Spartans.
The Spartans kept their oath. For five hundred years their city continued one of the chief cities of Greece, and their army the most warlike and dreaded of the armies of the earth. As for Lycurgus, his countrymen worshipped him as a god, and imputed to him all that was noble in their institutions and excellent in their laws.
Alcibiades, who had left the Spartans out of anger on account of their treatment of him, was recalled, and assumed command. The oligarchical rule was overturned in four months after its establishment, and the democracy restored, the assembly being still limited, however, to five thousand citizens. Alcibiades was not reelected general. He now withdrew, and, three years later, died.
The guilt of renewing these suicidal quarrels lies with the Spartans, who had long been nursing their grudge against Athens, and were waiting for the opportunity to inflict on her a fatal blow. But at the very moment when they were meditating this act of perfidy a double disaster fell upon them at home, demanding all their exertions to save them from ruin.
The German women used to say that 'Babies come out of the cabbage-heads. The Irish peasant ties a cabbage-leaf around the neck for sore throat. According to Gerarde, the Spartans ate watercress with their bread, firmly believing that it increased their wit and wisdom. The old proverb is, 'Eat cress to learn more wit.
At length Sphodrias was prevailed upon to agree to this, and, with his soldiery, invaded Attica by night. He got as far as Eleusis, but there the soldiers lost heart, and the attempt was detected. So, having involved the Spartans in a war of no slight importance, he retired to Thespiæ.
Lysander intended to be the leader of the 30 Spartans, and expected through them to be the virtual commander of the expedition of which Agesilaus was nominally the head. Since the time of Agamemnon no Grecian king had led an army into Asia; and Agesilaus studiously availed himself of the prestige of that precedent in order to attract recruits to his standard.
The Spartans knelt behind their shields, but the arrows pierced them, and the bravest men died sorrowfully, lamenting not for death, but because they died without striking a blow for Sparta. In his distress Pausanias called upon the goddess Hera, and the omens suddenly became favorable, and the Spartans with their Tegean allies threw themselves upon the enemy.
Word Of The Day