Plutarch: Lives of the noble Grecians and Romans
out as far as the river Eurotas, lifting up their hands, and
thanking the gods, that Sparta was now cleared again of the
disgrace and indignity that had befallen her, and once more saw the
light of day. Since before, they tell us, the Spartan men, out of
shame at their disasters, did not dare so much as to look their
wives in the face.
When Epaminondas restored Messene, and recalled from all quarters
the ancient citizens to inhabit it, they were not able to obstruct
the design, being not in condition of appearing in the field
against them. But it went greatly against Agesilaus in the minds
of his countrymen, when they found so large a territory, equal to
their own in compass, and for fertility the richest of all Greece,
which they had enjoyed so long, taken from them in his reign.
Therefore it was that the king broke off treaty with the Thebans,
when they offered him peace, rather than set his hand to the
passing away of that country, though it was already taken from him.
Which point of honor had like to have cost him dear; for not long
after he was overreached by a stratagem, which had almost amounted
to the loss of Sparta. For when the Mantineans again revolted from
Thebes to Sparta, and Epaminondas understood that Agesilaus was
come to their assistance with a powerful army, he privately in the
night quitted his quarters at Tegea, and unknown to the Mantineans,
passing by Agesilaus, marched towards Sparta, insomuch that he
failed very little of taking it empty and unarmed. Agesilaus had
intelligence sent him by Euthynus, the Thespian, as Callisthenes
says, but Xenophon says by a Cretan; and immediately dispatched a
horseman to Lacedaemon, to apprise them of it, and to let them know
that he was hastening to them. Shortly after his arrival the
Thebans crossed the Eurotas. They made an assault upon the town,
and were received by Agesilaus with great courage, and with
exertions beyond what was to be expected at his years. For he did
not now fight with that caution and cunning which he formerly made
use of, but put all upon a desperate push; which, though not his
usual method, succeeded so well, that he rescued the city out of
the very hands of Epaminondas, and forced him to retire, and, at
the erection of a trophy, was able, in the presence of their wives
and children, to declare that the Lacedaemonians had nobly paid
their debt to their country, and particularly his son Archidamus,
who had that day made himself illustrious, both by his courage and
agility of body, rapidly passing about by the short lanes to every
endangered point, and everywhere maintaining the town against the
enemy with but few to help him. Isadas, however, the son of
Phoebidas, must have been, I think, the admiration of the enemy as
well as of his friends. He was a youth of remarkable beauty and
stature, in the very flower of the most attractive time of life,
when the boy is just rising into the man. He had no arms upon him,
and scarcely clothes; he had just anointed himself at home, when
upon the alarm, without further waiting, in that undress, he
snatched a spear in one hand, and a sword in the other, and broke
his way through the combatants to the enemies, striking at all he
met. He received no wound, whether it were that a special divine
care rewarded his valor with an extraordinary protection, or
whether his shape being so large and beautiful, and his dress so
unusual, they thought him more than a man. The Ephors gave him a
garland; but as soon as they had done so, they fined him a thousand
drachmas, for going out to battle unarmed.
A few days after this there was another battle fought near
Mantinea, in which Epaminondas, having routed the van of the
Lacedaemonians, was eager in the pursuit of them, when Anticrates,
the Laconian, wounded him with a spear, says Dioscorides; but the
Spartans to this day call the posterity of this Anticrates,
swordsmen, because he wounded Epaminondas with a sword. They so
dreaded Epaminondas when living, that the slayer of him was
embraced and admired by all; they decreed honors and gifts to him,
and an exemption from taxes to his posterity, a privilege enjoyed
at this day by Callicrates, one of his descendants.
Epaminondas being slain, there was a general peace again concluded,
from which Agesilaus's party excluded the Messenians, as men that
had no city, and therefore would not let them swear to the league;
to which when the rest of the Greeks admitted them, the
Lacedaemonians broke off, and continued the war alone, in hopes of
subduing the Messenians. In this Agesilaus was esteemed a stubborn
and headstrong man, and insatiable of war, who took such pains to
undermine the general peace, and to protract the war at a time when
he had not money to carry it on with, but was forced to borrow of
his friends and raise subscriptions, with much difficulty, while
the city, above all things, needed repose. And all this to recover
the one poor town of Messene, after he had lost so great an empire
both by sea and land, as the Spartans were possessed of, when he
began to reign.
But it added still more to his ill-repute when he put himself into
the service of Tachos, the Egyptian. They thought it too unworthy
of a man of his high station, who was then looked upon as the first
commander in all Greece, who had filled all countries with his
renown, to let himself out to hire to a barbarian, an Egyptian
rebel, (for Tachos was no better) and to fight for pay, as captain
only of a band of mercenaries. If, they said, at those years of
eighty and odd, after his body had been worn out with age, and
enfeebled with wounds, he had resumed that noble undertaking, the
liberation of the Greeks from Persia, it had been worthy of some
reproof. To make an action honorable, it ought to be agreeable to
the age, and other circumstances of the person; since it is
circumstance and proper measure that give an action its character,
and make it either good or bad. But Agesilaus valued not other
men's discourses; he thought no public employment dishonorable; the
ignoblest thing in his esteem, was for a man to sit idle and
useless at home, waiting for his death to come and take him. The
money, therefore, that he received from Tachos, he laid out in
raising men, with whom having filled his ships, he took also thirty
Spartan counselors with him, as formerly he had done in his Asiatic
expedition, and set sail for Egypt.
As soon as he arrived in Egypt, all the great officers of the
kingdom came to pay their compliments to him at his landing. His
reputation being so great had raised the expectation of the whole
country, and crowds flocked in to see him; but when they found,
instead of the splendid prince whom they looked for, a little old
man of contemptible appearance, without all ceremony lying down
upon the grass, in coarse and threadbare clothes, they fell into
laughter and scorn of him, crying out, that the old proverb was;
now made good, "The mountain had brought forth a mouse." They were
yet more astonished at his stupidity, as they thought it, who, when
presents were made him of all sorts of provisions, took only the
meal, the calves, and the geese, but rejected the sweetmeats, the
confections and perfumes; and when they urged him to the acceptance
of them, took them and gave them to the helots in his army. Yet he
was taken, Theophrastus tells us, with the garlands they made of
the papyrus, because of their simplicity, and when he returned
home, he demanded one of the king, which he carried with him.
When he joined with Tachos, he found his expectation of being
general-in-chief disappointed. Tachos reserved that place for
himself, making Agesilaus only captain of the mercenaries, and
Chabrias, the Athenian, commander of the fleet. This was the first
occasion of his discontent, but there followed others; he was
compelled daily to submit to the insolence and vanity of this
Egyptian, and was at length forced to attend him into Phoenicia, in
a condition much below his character and dignity, which he bore and
put up with for a time, till he had opportunity of showing his
feelings. It was afforded him by Nectanabis, the cousin of Tachos,
who commanded a large force under him, and shortly after deserted
him, and was proclaimed king by the Egyptians. This man invited
Agesilaus to join his party, and the like he did to Chabrias,
offering great rewards to both. Tachos, suspecting it, immediately
applied himself both to Agesilaus and Chabrias, with great humility
beseeching their continuance in his friendship. Chabrias consented
to it, and did what he could by persuasion and good words to keep
Agesilaus with them. But he gave this short reply, "You, O
Chabrias, came hither a volunteer, and may go and stay as you see
cause; but I am the servant of Sparta, appointed to head the
Egyptians, and therefore I cannot fight against those to whom I was
sent as a friend, unless I am commanded to do so by my country."
This being said, he dispatched messengers to Sparta, who were
sufficiently supplied with matter both for dispraise of Tachos, and
commendation of Nectanabis. The two Egyptians also sent their
ambassadors to Lacedaemon, the one to claim continuance of the
league already made, the other to make great offers for the
breaking of it, and making a new one. The Spartans having heard
both sides, gave in their public answer, that they referred the
whole matter to Agesilaus; but privately wrote to him, to act as he
should find it best for the profit of the commonwealth. Upon
receipt of his orders, he at once changed sides, carrying all the
mercenaries with him to Nectanabis, covering with the plausible
presence of acting for the benefit of his country, a most
questionable piece of conduct, which, stripped of that disguise, in
real truth was no better than downright treachery. But the
Lacedaemonians, who make it their first principle of action to
serve their country's interest, know not anything to be just or
unjust by any measure but that.
Tachos, being thus deserted by the mercenaries, fled for it; upon
which a new king of the Mendesian province was proclaimed his
successor, and came against Nectanabis with an army of one hundred
thousand men. Nectanabis, in his talk with Agesilaus, professed to
despise them as newly raised men, who, though many in number, were
of no skill in war, being most of them mechanics and tradesmen,
never bred to war. To whom Agesilaus answered, that he did not
fear their numbers, but did fear their ignorance, which gave no
room for employing stratagem against them. Stratagem only avails
with men who are alive to suspicion, and expecting to be assailed,
expose themselves by their attempts at defense; but one who has no
thought or expectation of anything, gives as little opportunity to
the enemy, as he who stands stock-still does to a wrestler. The
Mendesian was not wanting in solicitations of Agesilaus, insomuch
that Nectanabis grew jealous. But when Agesilaus advised to fight
the enemy at once, saying, it was folly to protract the war and
rely on time, in a contest with men who had no experience in
fighting battles, but with their great numbers might be able to
surround them, and cut off their communications by entrenchments,
and anticipate them in many matters of advantage, this altogether
confirmed him in his fears and suspicions. He took quite the
contrary course, and retreated into a large and strongly fortified
town. Agesilaus, finding himself mistrusted, took it very ill, and
was full of indignation, yet was ashamed to change sides back
again, or to go away without effecting anything, so that he was
forced to follow Nectanabis into the town.
When the enemy came up, and began to draw lines about the town, and