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Updated: June 12, 2025
This Antalcidas was a Spartan, the son of one Leon, who, acting for the king's interest, induced the Lacedaemonians to covenant to let all the Greek cities in Asia and the islands adjacent to it become subject and tributary to him, peace being upon these conditions established among the Greeks, if indeed the honorable name of peace can fairly be given to what was in fact the disgrace and betrayal of Greece, a treaty more inglorious than had ever been the result of any war to those defeated in it.
Athens obtained the countenance of Persia, and the counter-diplomacy of Sparta produced the peace known by the name of the Spartan Antalcidas, establishing generally the autonomy of Greek cities. But this in effect meant the restoration of Spartan domination.
This made Antalcidas say, when he saw him wounded, "The Thebans pay you well for making them good soldiers who neither were willing nor able to fight you before." These ordinances he called Rhetræ, as if they had been oracles and decrees of the Deity himself.
In addition to the entire fleet of Persia, Dionysius of Syracuse had placed 20 triremes at the service of the Lacedaemonians; and Antalcidas now sailed with a large fleet to the Hellespont, where Iphicrates and the Athenians were still predominant.
She sent Antalcidas to Ionia, offering to surrender the Asiatic Greeks, and promising a universal autonomy throughout the Grecian world. These overtures were disliked by the allies, who sent Conon to counteract them. But Antalcidas gained the favor of the Persian satrap Tiribasus, who had succeeded Tissaphernes, and he privately espoused the cause of Sparta, and seized Conon and caused his death.
This disgraceful peace, called the PEACE OF ANTALCIDAS, was concluded in the year B.C. 387. By it Greece seemed prostrated at the feet of the barbarians; for its very terms, engraven on stone and set up in the sanctuaries of Greece, recognised the Persian king as the arbiter of her destinies.
Although Athens cannot be entirely exonerated from the blame of this transaction, the chief guilt rests upon Sparta, whose designs were far deeper and more hypocritical than they appeared. No sooner was the peace of Antalcidas concluded than Sparta, directed by Agesilaus, the ever-active enemy of Thebes, exerted all her power to weaken that city.
And therefore Artaxerxes, though always abominating other Spartans, and looking upon them, as Dinon says, to be the most impudent men living, gave wonderful honor to Antalcidas when he came to him into Persia; so much so that one day, taking a garland of flowers and dipping it in the most precious ointment, he sent it to him after supper, a favor which all were amazed at.
And a common Spartan of less note, being in company with an Argive, who was bragging how many Spartans lay buried in the fields of Argos, replied, "None of you are buried in the country of Laconia." Yet now the case was so altered, that Antalcidas, being one of the Ephors, out of fear sent away his children privately to the island of Cythera.
And this is what Agesilaus was much blamed for, a long time after; it being thought, that, by his continual incursions into Boeotia, he made the Thebans a match for the Lacedaemonians; and therefore Antalcidas, seeing him wounded one day, said to him, that he was very well paid for taking such pains to make the Thebans good soldiers, whether they would or no.
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