Phocion the Good (Routledge Revivals) by Lawrence A. Tritle

Author:Lawrence A. Tritle [Tritle, Lawrence A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, Ancient, General, Greece
ISBN: 9781317750499
Google: dePgAwAAQBAJ
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2014-06-23T16:05:27+00:00

7

Phocionic Athens

Demades, the orator, when in the height of the power which he obtained…was wont to excuse himself by saying he steered only the shipwrecks of the commonwealth. This hardy saying of his might have some appearance of truth, if applied to Phocion’s government.

Dryden’s Plutarch, Life of Phocion 1. 1–2

One old duskolos will soon be out of your way.

Menander, Dyskolos 147

The thanksgiving that greeted Alexander’s death in Athens no doubt prevailed through most of Greece. The king’s death also relieved some Macedonians as well, notably Antipater whom Alexander had intended to depose.1 Though Athens and many other Greek states thought immediately of autonomy and freedom, the catalyst that set the Greeks in motion was an independent army of mercenaries.2

At Taenarum, the southernmost tip of the Peloponnese, a mercenary emporium was organized shortly after the collapse of Agis’ revolt (post 331 BC).3 Activity at this base probably declined for a brief period, but within a few years it again flourished as a rallying point for unemployed mercenaries. The reasons for this resurgence lay in the affairs of the East, where Alexander had ordered his satraps to disband their mercenary armies (325/4 BC). Thousands of unemployed but highly skilled Greek mercenaries were discharged with no other prospect than Macedonian service, as many had no home in Greece to which they could return.4 Those who survived the long journey west reached Asia Minor, whence they were ferried across the Aegean to Taenarum. Among those who reached this mercenary sanctuary were former Persian satraps and other officers who provided experienced leadership to the veteran force. The man responsible for this operation was Leosthenes, an Athenian soldier of fortune, who was himself a former mercenary in either Persian or Macedonian service. Sometime during 325/4 BC the mercenary army at Taenarum elected Leosthenes as their com- mander-in-chief.5

As the commander of a veteran army, Leosthenes soon opened negotiations with Athens and succeeded in winning support for himself and his force. The Athenians restored his citizenship, for in 324/3 BC Leosthenes served as Athenian stratêgos epi tên chôran.6 This restoration indicates the influential aid that Leosthenes enjoyed in Athens, where Hypereides provided valuable assistance. Hypereides’ support for the mercenary army is not surprising as he had proposed maintenance for the first mercenary establishment at Taenarum, which the Athenian general Chares had commanded. Moreover, Hypereides later joined Leosthenes in the political debates preceding the outbreak of the Lamian War.7 During this year (i.e., 324/3 BC) it appears that Athens maintained communications with the mercenary army through Leosthenes, and after August 324 BC funds left by Harpalus could be (and probably were) diverted to it.8 Additional preparations for war were made, and in the elections for the stratêgia of 323/2 BC Leosthenes was elected stratêgos epi ta hopla.9 Consequently when reports of Alexander’s death reached Athens in June 323 BC (about the time stratêgoi entered office), Athens was already on a war footing and the king’s death removed the last obstacle.

Demosthenes, exiled after his conviction in the Harpalus process, did not participate in the debates over the war in Athens.

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