The succession of Macedonian kings from Alexander the Great to the extinction of the monarchy will be seen from the following table:--
B.C.
Philip III. Arrhidaeus . . . . . . . . 323-316 Ca.s.sander . . . . . . . . 316-296 Philip IV. . . . . . . . . 296-295 Demetrius I. Poliorcetes . . . . . . . . 294-287 Pyrrhus . . . . . . . . 287-286 Lysimachus . . . . . . . . 286-280 Ptolemy Ceraunus and others . . . . . . . . 280-277 Antigonus Gonatas . . . . . . . . 277-239 Demetrius II . . . . . . . . 239-229 Antigonus Doson . . . . . . . . 229-220 Philip V . . . . . . . . 220-178 Perseus . . . . . . . . 178-167
In the following year Antigonus was succeeded by Philip V., the son of Demetrius II., who was then about sixteen or seventeen years of age.
His youth encouraged the AEtolians to make predatory incursions into the Peloponnesus. That people were a species of freebooters, and the terror of their neighbours; yet they were united, like the Achaeans, in a confederacy or league. The Aetolian League was a confederation of tribes instead of cities, like the Achaean. The diet or council of the league, called the Panaetolic.u.m, a.s.sembled every autumn, generally at Thermon, to elect the strategus and other officers; but the details of its affairs were conducted by a committee called APOCLETI, who seem to have formed a sort of permanent council, The AEtolians had availed themselves of the disorganised state of Greece consequent upon the death of Alexander to extend their power, and had gradually made themselves masters of Locris, Phocis, Boeotia, together with portions of Acarnania, Thessaly, and Epirus. Thus both the Amphictyonic Council and the oracle of Delphi were in their power. They had early wrested Naupactus from the Achaeans, and had subsequently acquired several Peloponnesian cities.
Such was the condition of the AEtolians at the time of Philip"s accession. Soon after that event we find them, under the leadership of Dorimachus, engaged in a series of freebooting expeditions in Messenia, and other parts of Peloponnesus. Aratus marched to the a.s.sistance of the Messenians at the head of the Achaean forces, but was totally defeated in a battle near Caphyae. The Achaeans now saw no hope of safety except through the a.s.sistance of Philip. That young monarch was ambitious and enterprising possessing considerable military ability and much political sagacity. He readily listened to the application of the Achaeans, and in 220 entered into an alliance with them. The war which ensued between the AEtolians on the one side, and the Achaeans, a.s.sisted by Philip, on the other, and which lasted about three years, has been called the Social War. Philip gained several victories over the AEtolians, but he concluded a treaty of peace with them in 217, because he was anxious to turn his arms against another and more formidable power.
The great struggle now going on between Rome and Carthage attracted the attention of the whole civilized world. If was evident that Greece, distracted by intestine quarrels, must be soon swallowed up by whichever of those great states might prove successful; and of the two, the ambition of the Romans, who had already gained a footing on the eastern sh.o.r.es of the Adriatic was by far the more formidable to Greece. After the conclusion of the peace with the AEtolians Philip prepared a large fleet, which he employed to watch the movements of the Romans, and in the following year (216) he concluded a treaty with Hannibal, which, among other clauses, provided that the Romans should not be allowed to retain their conquests on the eastern side of the Adriatic. He even meditated an invasion of Italy, and with that view endeavoured to make himself master of Apollonia and Oric.u.m. But though he succeeded in taking the latter city, the Romans surprised his camp whilst he was besieging Apollonia, and compelled him to burn his ships and retire. Meanwhile Philip had acted in a most arbitrary manner in the affairs of Greece; and when Aratus remonstrated with him respecting his proceedings, he got rid of his former friend and counsellor by means of a slow and secret poison (B.C. 213).
In B.C., 209 the Achaeans, being hard pressed by the AEtolians, were again induced to call in the aid of Philip. The spirit of the Achaeans was at this time revived by Philopoemen, one of the few n.o.ble characters of the period, and who has been styled by Plutarch "the last of the Greeks." He was a native of Megalopolis in Arcadia, and in 208 was elected Strategus of the league. In both these posts Philopoemen made great alterations and improvements in the arms and discipline of the Achaean forces, which he a.s.similated to those of the Macedonian phalanx. These reforms, as well as the public spirit with which he had inspired the Achaeans were attended with the most beneficial results.
In 207 Philopoemen gained at Mantinea a signal victory over the Lacedaemonians, who had joined the Roman alliance; 4000 of them were left upon the field, and among them Machanidas who had made himself tyrant of Sparta. This decisive battle, combined with the withdrawal of the Romans, who, being desirous of turning their undivided attention towards Carthage, had made peace with Philip (205), secured for a few years the tranquillity of Greece. It also raised the fame of Philopoemen to its highest point; and in the next Nemean festival, being a second time general of the league, he was hailed by the a.s.sembled Greeks as the liberator of their country.
Upon the conclusion of the second Punic war the Romans renewed their enterprises in Greece, and declared war against Philip (B.C. 200). For some time the war lingered on without any decided success on either side; but in 198 the consul T. Quinctius Flamininus succeeded in gaining over the Achaean league to the Roman alliance; and as the AEtolians had previously deserted Philip, both those powers fought for a short time on the same side. In 197 the struggle was brought to a termination by the battle of Cynoscephalae, near Scotussa, in Thessaly, which decided the fate of the Macedonian monarchy. Philip was obliged to sue for peace, and in the following year (196) a treaty was ratified by which the Macedonians were compelled to renounce their supremacy, to withdraw their garrisons from the Grecian towns, to surrender their fleet, and to pay 1000 talents for the expenses of the war. At the ensuing Isthmian games Flamininus solemnly proclaimed the freedom of the Greeks, and was received by them with overwhelming joy and grat.i.tude.
The AEtolians, dissatisfied with these arrangements, persuaded Antiochus III., king of Syria, to enter into a league against the Romans. He pa.s.sed over into Greece with a wholly inadequate force, and was defeated by the Romans at Thermopylae (B.C. 191). The AEtolians were now compelled to make head against the Romans by themselves.
After some ineffectual attempts at resistance they were reduced to sue for peace, which they at length obtained, but on the most humiliating conditions (B.C. 189). They were required to acknowledge the supremacy of Rome, to renounce all the conquests they had recently made, to pay an indemnity of 500 talents and to engage in future to aid the Romans in their wars. The power of the AEtolian league was thus for ever crushed, though it seems to have existed, in name at least, till a much later period.
The Achaean league still subsisted but was destined before long to experience the same fate as its rival. At first, indeed, it enjoyed the protection of the Romans, and even acquired an extension of members through their influence, but this protectorate involved a state of almost absolute dependence. Philopoemen also had succeeded, in the year 192, in adding Sparta to the league, which now embraced the whole of Peloponnesus. But Sparta having displayed symptoms of insubordination, Philopoemen marched against it in 188, and captured the city; when he put to death eighty of the leading men, razed the walls and fortifications, abolished the inst.i.tutions of Lycurgus, and compelled the citizens to adopt the democratic const.i.tution of the Achaeans.
Meanwhile the Romans regarded with satisfaction the internal dissensions of Greece, which they foresaw would only render her an easier prey, and neglected to answer the appeals of the Spartans for protection. In 183 the Messenians, under the leadership of Dinocrates, having revolted from the league, Philopoemen, who had now attained the age of 70, led an expedition against them; but having fallen from his horse in a skirmish of cavalry, he was captured, and conveyed with many circ.u.mstances of ignominy to Messene, where, after a sort of mock trial, he was executed. His fate was avenged by Lycortas, the commander of the Achaean cavalry, the father of the historian Polybius.
In B.C. 179 Philip died, and was succeeded by his son Perseus, the last monarch of Macedonia. The latter years of the reign of Philip had been spent in preparations for a renewal of the war, which he foresaw to be inevitable; yet a period of seven years elapsed after the accession of Perseus before the mutual enmity of the two powers broke out into open hostilities. The war was protracted three years without any decisive result; but was brought to a conclusion in 168 by the consul L.
AEmilius Paulus, who defeated Perseus with great loss near Pydna.
Perseus was carried to Rome to adorn the triumph of Paulus (167), and was permitted to spend the remainder of his life in a sort of honourable captivity at Alba. Such was the end of the Macedonian empire, which was now divided into four districts, each under the jurisdiction of an oligarchical council.
The Roman commissioners deputed to arrange the affairs of Macedonia did not confine their attention to that province, but evinced their design of bringing all Greece under the Roman sway. In these views they were a.s.sisted by various despots and traitors in different Grecian cities, and especially by Callicrates, a man of great influence among the Achaeans, and who for many years lent himself as the base tool of the Romans to effect the enslavement of his country. After the fall of Macedonia, Callicrates denounced more than a thousand leading Achaeans who had favoured the cause of Perseus. These, among whom was Polybius the historian, were apprehended and sent to Rome for trial. A still harder fate was experienced by AEtolia, Boeotia, Acarnania, and Epirus.
In the last-named country, especially, no fewer than seventy of the princ.i.p.al towns were abandoned by Paulus to his soldiers for pillage, and 150,000 persons are said to have been sold into slavery.
A quarrel between the Achaeans and Sparta afforded the Romans a pretence for crushing the small remains of Grecian independence by the destruction of the Achaean league.
The Spartans, feeling themselves incompetent to resist the Achaeans, appealed to the Romans for a.s.sistance; and in 147 two Roman commissioners were sent to Greece to settle the disputes between the two states. These commissioners decided that not only Sparta, but Corinth, and all the other cities, except those of Achaia, should be restored to their independence. This decision occasioned serious riots at Corinth, the most important city of the league. All the Spartans in the town were seized, and even the Roman commissioners narrowly escaped violence. On their return to Rome a fresh emba.s.sy was despatched to demand satisfaction for these outrages. But the violent and impolitic conduct of Critolaus, then Strategus of the league, rendered all attempts at accommodation fruitless, and after the return of the amba.s.sadors the Senate declared war against the league. The cowardice and incompetence of Critolaus as a general were only equalled by his previous insolence. On the approach of the Romans under Metellus from Macedonia he did not even venture to make a stand at Thermopylae; and being overtaken by them near Scarphea in Locris, he was totally defeated, and never again heard of. Diaeus, who succeeded him as Strategus, displayed rather more energy and courage. But a fresh Roman force under Mummius having landed on the isthmus, Diaeus was overthrown in a battle near Corinth; and that city was immediately evacuated not only by the troops of the league, but also by the greater part of the inhabitants. On entering it Mummius put the few males who remained to the sword; sold the women and children as slaves and having carried away all its treasures, consigned it to the flames (B.C. 146). Corinth was filled with masterpieces of ancient art; but Mummius was so insensible to their surpa.s.sing excellence as to stipulate with those who contracted to convey them to Italy, that, if any were lost in the pa.s.sage, they should be replaced by others of equal value! Mummius then employed himself in chastising and regulating the whole of Greece; and ten commissioners were sent from Rome to settle its future condition. The whole country, to the borders of Macedonia and Epirus, was formed into a Roman province, under the name of ACHAIA, derived from that confederacy which had made the last struggle for its political existence.
CHAPTER XXII.
SKETCH OF THE HISTORY OF GREEK LITERATURE FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO THE REIGN OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT.
The Greeks possessed two large collections of epic poetry. The one comprised poems relating to the great events and enterprises of the Heroic age, and characterised by a certain poetical unity; the other included works tamer in character and more desultory in their mode of treatment, containing the genealogies of men and G.o.ds, narratives of the exploits of separate heroes, and descriptions of the ordinary pursuits of life. The poems of the former cla.s.s pa.s.sed under the name of Homer; while those of the latter were in the same general way ascribed to Hesiod. The former were the productions of the Ionic and AEolic minstrels in Asia Minor, among whom Homer stood pre-eminent and eclipsed the brightness of the rest: the latter were the compositions of a school of bards in the neighbourhood of Mount Helicon in Boeotia, among whom in like manner Hesiod enjoyed the greatest celebrity. The poems of both schools were composed in the hexameter metre and in a similar dialect; but they differed widely in almost every other feature.
Of the Homeric poems the Iliad and the Odyssey were the most distinguished and have alone come down to us. The subject of the Iliad was the exploits of Achilles and of the other Grecian heroes before Ilium or Troy; that of the Odyssey was the wanderings and adventures of Odysseus or Ulysses after the capture of Troy on his return to his native island. Throughout the flourishing period of Greek literature these unrivalled works were universally regarded as the productions of a single mind; but there was very little agreement respecting the place of the poet"s birth the details of his life, or the time in which he lived. Seven cities laid claim to Homer"s birth, and most of them had legends to tell respecting his romantic parentage, his alleged blindness, and his life of an itinerant bard acquainted with poverty and sorrow. It cannot be disputed that he was an Asiatic Greek; but this is the only fact in his life which can be regarded as certain.
Several of the best writers of antiquity supposed him to have been a native of the island of Chios; but most modern scholars believe Smyrna to have been his birthplace. His most probable date is about B.C. 850.
The mode in which these poems were preserved has occasioned great controversy in modern times. Even if they were committed to writing by the poet himself, and were handed down to posterity in this manner, it is certain that they were rarely read. We must endeavour to realise the difference between ancient Greece and our own times. During the most flourishing period of Athenian literature ma.n.u.scripts were indifferently written, without division into parts, and without marks of punctuation. They were scarce and costly, could be obtained only by the wealthy, and read only by those who had had considerable literary training. Under these circ.u.mstances the Greeks could never become a reading people; and thus the great ma.s.s even of the Athenians became acquainted with the productions of the leading poets of Greece only by hearing them recited at their solemn festivals and on other public occasions. This was more strikingly the case at an earlier period.
The Iliad and the Odyssey were not read by individuals in private, but were sung or recited at festivals or to a.s.sembled companies. The bard originally sung his own lays to the accompaniment of his lyre. He was succeeded by a body of professional reciters, called Rhapsodists, who rehea.r.s.ed the poems of others, and who appear at early times to have had exclusive possession of the Homeric poems. But in the seventh century before the Christian era literary culture began to prevail among the Greeks; and men of education and wealth were naturally desirous of obtaining copies of the great poet of the nation. From this cause copies came to be circulated among the Greeks; but most of them contained only separate portions of the poems, or single rhapsodes, as they were called. Pisistratus, the tyrant or despot of Athens, is said to have been the first person who collected and arranged the poems in their present form, in order that they might be recited at the great Panathenaic festival at Athens.
Three works have come down to us bearing the name of Hesiod--the "Works and Days," the "Theogony," and a description of the "Shield of Hercules." Many ancient critics believed the "Works and Days" to be the only genuine work of Hesiod, and their opinion has been adopted by most modern scholars. We learn from this work that Hesiod was a native of Ascra, a village at the foot of Mount Helicon, to which his father had migrated from the AEolian Cyme in Asia Minor. He further tells us that he gained the prize at Chalcis in a poetical contest; and that he was robbed of a fair share of his heritage by the unrighteous decision of judges who had been bribed by his brother Perses. The latter became afterwards reduced in circ.u.mstances, and applied to his brother for relief; and it is to him that Hesiod addresses his didactic poem of the "Works and Days," in which he lays down various moral and social maxims for the regulation of his conduct and his life. It contains an interesting representation of the feelings, habits, and superst.i.tions of the rural population of Greece in the earlier ages. Respecting the date of Hesiod nothing certain can be affirmed. Modern writers usually suppose him to have flourished two or three generations later than Homer.
The commencement of Greek lyric poetry as a cultivated species of composition dates from the middle of the seventh century before the Christian era. No important event either in the public or private life of a Greek could dispense with this accompaniment; and the lyric song was equally needed to solemnize the worship of the G.o.ds, to cheer the march to battle, or to enliven the festive board. The lyric poetry, with the exception of that of Pindar, has almost entirely perished, and all that we possess of it; consists of a few songs and isolated fragments.
The great satirist ARCHILOCHUS was one of the earliest and most celebrated of all the lyric poets. He was a native of the island of Paros, and flourished about the year 700 B.C. His fame rests chiefly on his terrible satires, composed in the Iambic metre, in which he gave vent to the bitterness of a disappointed man.
TYRTAEUS and ALCMAN were the two great lyric poets of Sparta, though neither of them was a native of Lacedaemon. The personal history of Tyrtaeus, and his warlike songs which roused the fainting courage of the Spartans during the second Messenian war, have already been mentioned. Alcman was originally a Lydian slave in a Spartan family, and was emanc.i.p.ated by his master. He lived shortly after the second Messenian war. His poems partake of the character of this period, which was one of repose and enjoyment after the fatigues and perils of war. Many of his songs celebrate the pleasures of good eating and drinking; but the more important were intended to be sung by a chorus at the public festivals of Sparta.
ARION was a native of Methymna in Lesbos, and lived some time at the court of Periander, tyrant of Corinth, who began to reign B.C. 625.
Nothing is known of his life beyond the beautiful story of his escape from the sailors with whom he sailed from Sicily to Corinth. On one occasion, thus runs the story, Arion went to Sicily to take part in a musical contest. He won the prize, and, laden with presents, he embarked in a Corinthian ship to return to his friend Periander. The rude sailors coveted his treasures, and meditated his murder. After imploring them in vain to spare his life, he obtained permission to play for the last time on his beloved lyre. In festal attire he placed himself on the prow of the vessel, invoked the G.o.ds in inspired strains, and then threw himself into the sea. But many song-loving dolphins had a.s.sembled round the vessel, and one of them now took the bard on its back, and carried him to Taenarum, from whence he returned to Corinth in safety, and related his adventure to Periander. Upon the arrival of the Corinthian vessel, Periander inquired of the sailors after Arion, who replied that he had remained behind at Tarentum; but when Arion, at the bidding of Periander, came forward, the sailors owned their guilt, and were punished according to their desert. The great improvement in lyric poetry ascribed to Arion is the invention of the Dithyramb. This was a choral song and dance in honour of the G.o.d Dionysus, and is of great interest in the history of poetry, since it was the germ from which sprung at a later time the magnificent productions of the tragic Muse at Athens.
ALCAEUS and SAPPHO were both natives of Mytilene in the island of Lesbos, and flourished about B.C. 610-580. Their songs were composed for a single voice, and not for the chorus, and they were each the inventor of a new metre, which bears their name, and is familiar to us by the well-known odes of Horace. Their poetry was the warm outpouring of the writers" inmost feelings, and present the lyric poetry of the AEolians at its highest point.
Alcaeus took an active part in the civil dissensions of his native state, and warmly espoused the cause of the aristocratical party, to which he belonged by birth. When the n.o.bles were driven into exile, he endeavoured to cheer their spirits by a number of most animated odes, full of invectives against the popular party and its leaders.
Of the events of Sappho"s life we have scarcely any information; and the common story that, being in love with Phaon and finding her love unrequited, she leaped down from the Leucadian rock, seems to have been an invention of later times.
ANACREON was a native of the Ionian city of Teos. He spent part of his life at Samos, under the patronage of Polycrates; and after the death of this despot he went to Athens at the invitation of Hipparchus. The universal tradition of antiquity represents Anacreon as a consummate voluptuary; and his poems prove the truth of the tradition. His death was worthy of his life, if we may believe the account that he was choked by a grape-stone.
SIMONIDES, of the island of Ceos, was born B.C. 556, and reached a great age. He lived many years at Athens, both at the court of Hipparchus, together with Anacreon, and subsequently under the democracy during the Persian wars. The struggles of Greece for her independence furnished him with a n.o.ble subject for his muse. He carried away the prize from AEschylus with an elegy upon the warriors who had fallen at the battle of Marathon. Subsequently we find him celebrating the heroes of Thermopylae, Artemisium, Salamis, and Plataea. He was upwards of 80 when his long poetical career at Athens was closed with the victory which he gained with the dithyrambic chorus in B.C. 477, making the 56th prize that he had carried off. Shortly after this event he repaired to Syracuse at the invitation of Hiero.
Here he spent the remaining ten years of his life, not only entertaining Hiero with his poetry, but instructing him by his wisdom; for Simonides was a philosopher as well as a poet, and is reckoned amongst the sophists.
PINDAR, though the contemporary of Simonides, was considerably his junior: He was born either at, or in the neighbourhood of, Thebes in Boeotia, about the year 522 B.C. Later writers tell us that his future glory as a poet was miraculously foreshadowed by a swarm of bees which rested upon his lips while he was asleep, and that this miracle first led him to compose poetry. He commenced his professional career at an early age, and soon acquired so great a reputation, that he was employed by various states and princes of the h.e.l.lenic race to compose choral songs. He was courted especially by Alexander, king of Macedonia, and by Hiero, despot of Syracuse. The praises which he bestowed upon Alexander are said to have been the chief reason which led his descendant, Alexander the Great, to spare the house of the poet when he destroyed the rest of Thebes. The estimation in which Pindar was held is also shown by the honours conferred upon him by the free states of Greece. Although a Theban, he was always a great favourite with the Athenians, whom he frequently praised in his poems, and who testified their grat.i.tude by making him their public guest, and by giving him 10,000 drachmas. The only poems of Pindar which have come down to us entire are his Epinicia or triumphal odes, composed in commemoration of victories gained in the great public games. But these were only a small portion of his works. He also wrote hymns, paeans, dithyrambs, odes for processions, songs of maidens, mimic dancing songs, drinking songs, dirges and encomia, or panegyrics on princes.
The Greeks had arrived at a high pitch of civilization before they can be said to have possessed a HISTORY. The first essays in literary prose cannot be placed earlier than the sixth century before the Christian aera; but the first writer who deserves the name of an historian is HERODOTUS, hence called the Father of History. Herodotus was born in the Dorian colony of Halicarna.s.sus in Caria, in the year 484 B.C., and accordingly about the time of the Persian expeditions into Greece. He resided some years in Samos, and also undertook extensive travels, of which he speaks in his work. There was scarcely a town in Greece or on the coasts of Asia Minor with which he was not acquainted; he had explored Thrace and the coasts of the Black Sea; in Egypt he had penetrated as far south as Elephantine; and in Asia he had visited the cities of Babylon, Ecbatana, and Susa. The latter part of his life was spent at Thurii, a colony founded by the Athenians in Italy in B.C. 443. According to a well-known story in Lucian, Herodotus, when he had completed his work, recited it publicly at the great Olympic festival, as the best means of procuring for it that celebrity to which he felt that it was ent.i.tled. The effect is described as immediate and complete. The delighted audience at once a.s.signed the names of the nine Muses to the nine books into which it is divided. A still later author (Suidas) adds, that Thucydides, then a boy, was present at the festival with his father Olorus, and was so affected by the recital as to shed tears; upon which Herodotus congratulated Olorus on having a son who possessed so early such a zeal for knowledge. But there are many objections to the probability of these tales.
Herodotus interwove into his history all the varied and extensive knowledge acquired in his travels, and by big own personal researches.
But the real subject of the work is the conflict between the Greek race, in the widest sense of the term, and including the Greeks of Asia Minor, with the Asiatics. Thus the historian had a vast epic subject presented to him, which was brought to a natural and glorious termination by the defeat of the Persians in their attempts upon Greece. The work concludes with the reduction of Sestos by the Athenians, B.C. 478. Herodotus wrote in the Ionic dialect, and his style is marked by an ease and simplicity which lend it an indescribable charm.
THUCYDIDES, the greatest of the Greek historians, was an Athenian, and was born in the year 471 B.C. His family was connected with that of Miltiades and Cimon. He possessed gold-mines in Thrace, and enjoyed great influence in that country. He commanded an Athenian squadron of seven ships at Thasos, in 424 B.C., at the time when Brasidas was besieging Amphipolis; and having failed to relieve that city in time, he went into a voluntary exile, in order probably to avoid the punishment of death. He appears to have spent 20 years in banishment, princ.i.p.ally in the Peloponnesus, or in places under the dominion or influence of Sparta. He perhaps returned to Athens in B.C. 403, the date of its liberation by Thrasybulus. According to the unanimous testimony of antiquity he met with a violent end, and it seems probable that he was a.s.sa.s.sinated at Athens, since it cannot be doubted that his tomb existed there. From the beginning of the Peloponnesian war he had designed to write its history, and he employed himself in collecting materials for that purpose during its continuance; but it is most likely that the work was not actually composed till after the conclusion of the war, and that he was engaged upon it at the time of his death. The first book of his History is introductory, and contains a rapid sketch of Grecian history from the remotest times to the breaking out of the war. The remaining seven books are filled with the details of the war, related according to the division into summers and winters, into which all campaigns naturally fall; and the work breaks off abruptly in the middle of the 21st year of the war (B.C. 411). The materials of Thucydides were collected with the most scrupulous care; the events are related with the strictest impartiality; and the work probably offers a more exact account of a long and eventful period than any other contemporary history, whether ancient or modern, of an equally long and important aera. The style of Thucydides is brief and sententious, and whether in moral or political reasoning, or in description, gains wonderful force from its condensation. But this characteristic is sometimes carried to a faulty extent, so as to render his style harsh, and his meaning obscure.
XENOPHON, the son of Gryllus, was also an Athenian, and was probably born about B.C. 444. He was a pupil of Socrates, who saved his life at the battle of Delium (B.C. 424). His accompanying Cyrus the younger in his expedition against his brother Artaxerxes, king of Persia, formed a striking episode in his life, and has been recorded by himself in his ANABASIS. He seems to have been still in Asia at the time of the death of Socrates in 399 B.C., and was probably banished from Athens soon after that period, in consequence of his close connexion with the Lacedaemonians. He accompanied Agesilaus, the Spartan king, on the return of the latter from Asia to Greece; and he fought along with the Lacedaemonians against his own countrymen at the battle of Coronea in 394 B.C. After this battle he went with Agesilaus to Sparta, and soon afterwards settled at Scillus in Elis, near Olympia. He is said to have lived to more than 90 years of age, and he mentions an event which occurred as late as 357 B.C.
Probably all the works of Xenophon are still extant. The ANABASIS is the work on which his fame as an historian chiefly rests. It is written in a simple and agreeable style, and conveys much curious and striking information. The h.e.l.lENICA is a continuation of the history of Thucydides, and comprehends in seven books a s.p.a.ce of about 48 years; namely, from the time when Thucydides breaks off, B.C. 411, to the battle of Mantinea in 362. The subject is treated in a very dry and uninteresting style; and his evident partiality to Sparta, and dislike of Athens, have frequently warped his judgment, and must cause his statements to be received with some suspicion. The CYROPAEDIA, one of the most pleasing and popular of his works, professes to be a history of Cyrus, the founder of the Persian monarchy, but is in reality a kind of political romance, and possesses no authority whatever as an historical work. The design of the author seems to have been to draw a picture of a perfect state; and though the scene is laid in Persia, the materials of the work are derived from his own philosophical notions and the usages of Sparta engrafted on the popularly current stories respecting Cyrus. Xenophon displays in this work his dislike of democratic inst.i.tutions like those of Athens, and his preference for an aristocracy, or even a monarchy. Xenophon was also the author of several minor works; but the only other treatise which we need mention is the MEMORABILIA of Socrates, in four books, intended as a defence of his master against the charges which occasioned his death, and which undoubtedly contains a genuine picture of Socrates and his philosophy. The genius of Xenophon was not of the highest order; it was practical rather than speculative; but he is distinguished for his good sense, his moderate views, his humane temper, and his earnest piety.
The DRAMA pre-eminently distinguished Athenian literature. The democracy demanded a literature of a popular kind, the vivacity of the people a literature that made a lively impression; and both these conditions were fulfilled by the drama. But though brought to perfection among the Athenians, tragedy and comedy, in their rude and early origin, were Dorian inventions. Both arose out of the worship of Dionysus. There was at first but little distinction between these two species of the drama, except that comedy belonged more to the rural celebration of the Dionysiac festivals, and tragedy to that in cities.
The name of TRAGEDY was far from signifying any thing mournful, being derived from the goat-like appearance of those who, disguised as Satyrs, performed the old Dionysiac songs and dances. In like manner, COMEDY was called after the song of the band of revellers who celebrated the vintage festivals of Dionysus, and vented the rude merriment inspired by the occasion in jibes and extempore witticisms levelled at the spectators. Tragedy, in its more perfect form, was the offspring of the dithyrambic odes with which that worship was celebrated. These were not always of a joyous cast. Some of them expressed the sufferings of Dionysus; and it was from this more mournful species of dithyramb that tragedy, properly so called, arose.
The dithyrambic odes formed a kind of lyrical tragedy, and were sung by a chorus of fifty men, dancing round the altar of Dionysus. The improvements in the dithyramb were introduced by Arion at Corinth; and it was chiefly among the Dorian states of the Peloponnesus that these choral dithyrambic songs prevailed. Hence, even in attic tragedy, the chorus, which was the foundation of the drama, was written in the Doric dialect, thus clearly betraying the source from which the Athenians derived it.
In Attica an important alteration was made in the old tragedy in the time of Pisistratus, in consequence of which it obtained a new and dramatic character. This innovation is ascribed to THESPIS, a native of the Attic village of Icaria, B.C. 535. It consisted in the introduction of an actor for the purpose of giving rest to the chorus.
Thespis was succeeded by Ch.o.e.rilus and Phrynichus, the latter of whom gained his first prize in the dramatic contests in 511 B.C. The Dorian Pratinas, a native of Philius, but who exhibited his tragedies at Athens, introduced an improvement in tragedy by separating the Satyric from the tragic drama. As neither the popular taste nor the ancient religious a.s.sociations connected with the festivals of Dionysus would have permitted the chorus of Satyrs to be entirely banished from the tragic representations, Pratinas avoided this by the invention of what is called the Satyric drama; that is, a species of play in which the ordinary subjects of tragedy were treated in a lively and farcical manner, and in which the chorus consisted of a band of Satyrs in appropriate dresses and masks. After this period it became customary to exhibit dramas in TETRALOGIES, or sets of four; namely, a tragic trilogy, or series of three tragedies, followed by a Satyric play.
These were often on connected subjects; and the Satyric drama at the end served like a merry after-piece to relieve the minds of the spectators.
The subjects of Greek tragedy were taken, with few exceptions, from the national mythology. Hence the plot and story were of necessity known to the spectators, a circ.u.mstance which strongly distinguished the ancient tragedy from the modern. It must also be recollected that the representation of tragedies did not take place every day, but only, after certain fixed intervals, at the festivals of Dionysus, of which they formed one of the greatest attractions. During the whole day the Athenian public sat in the theatre witnessing tragedy after tragedy; and a prize was awarded by judges appointed for the purpose to the poet who produced the best set of dramas.
Such was Attic tragedy when it came into the hands of AESCHYLUS, who, from the great improvements which he introduced, was regarded by the Athenians as its father or founder, just as Homer was of Epic poetry, and Herodotus of History. AEschylus was born at Eleusis in Attica in B.C. 525, and was thus contemporary with Simonides and Pindar. He fought with his brother Cynaegirus at the battle of Marathon, and also at those of Artemisium, Salamis, and Plataea. In B.C. 484 he gained his first tragic prize. In 468 he was defeated in a tragic contest by his younger rival Sophocles; shortly afterwards he retired to the court of king Hiero, at Syracuse, He died at Gela, in Sicily, in 456, in the 69th year of his age. It is unanimously related that an eagle, mistaking the poet"s bald head for a stone, let a tortoise fall upon it in order to break the sh.e.l.l, thus fulfilling an oracle predicting that he was to die by a blow from heaven. The improvements introduced into tragedy by AEschylus concerned both its form and composition, and its manner of representation. In the former his princ.i.p.al innovation was the introduction of a second actor; whence arose the dialogue, properly so called, and the limitation of the choral parts, which now became subsidiary. His improvements in the manner of representing tragedy consisted in the introduction of painted scenes, drawn according to the rules of perspective. He furnished the actors with more appropriate and more magnificent dresses, invented for them more various and expressive masks, and raised their stature to the heroic size by providing them with thick-soled cothurni or buskins. AEschylus excels in representing the superhuman, in depicting demiG.o.ds and heroes, and in tracing the irresistible march of fate. His style resembles the ideas which it clothes: it is bold, sublime, and full of gorgeous imagery, but sometimes borders on the turgid.
SOPHOCLES, the younger rival and immediate successor of Aeschylus in the tragic art, was born at Colonus, a village about a mile from Athens, in B.C. 495. We have already adverted to his wresting the tragic prize from AEschylus in 468, from which time he seems to have retained the almost undisputed possession of the Athenian stage, until a young but formidable rival arose in the person of Euripides. The close of his life was troubled with family dissensions. Iophon, his son by an Athenian wife, and therefore his legitimate heir, was jealous of the affection manifested by his father for his grandson Sophocles, the offspring of another son, Ariston, whom he had had by a Sicyonian woman. Fearing lest his father should bestow a great part of his property upon his favourite, Iophon summoned him before the Phratores, or tribesmen, on the ground that his mind was affected. The old man"s only reply was--"If I am Sophocles I am not beside myself; and if I am beside myself I am not Sophocles." Then taking up his OEDIPUS AT COLONUS, which he had lately written, but had not yet brought out, he read from it a beautiful pa.s.sage, with which the judges were so struck that they at once dismissed the case. He died shortly afterwards, in B.C. 406, in his 90th year. As a poet Sophocles is universally allowed to have brought the drama to the greatest perfection of which it is susceptible. His plays stand in the just medium between the sublime but unregulated flights of AEschylus, and the too familiar scenes and rhetorical declamations of Euripides. His plots are worked up with more skill and care than the plots of either of his great rivals.
Sophocles added the last improvement to the form of the drama by the introduction of a third actor; a change which greatly enlarged the scope of the action. The improvement was so obvious that it was adopted by AEschylus in his later plays; but the number of three actors seems to have been seldom or never exceeded.
EURIPIDES was born in the island of Salamis, in B.C. 480 his parents having been among those who fled thither at the time of the invasion of Attics by Xerxes. He studied rhetoric under Prodicus, and physics under Anaxagoras and he also lived on intimate terms with Socrates. In 441 he gained his first prize, and he continued to exhibit plays until 408, the date of his Orestes. Soon after this he repaired to the court of Macedonia, at the invitation of king Archelaus, where he died two years afterwards at the age of 74 (B.C. 406). Common report relates that he was torn to pieces by the king"s dogs, which, according to some accounts, were set upon him by two rival poets out of envy. In treating his characters and subjects Euripides often arbitrarily departed from the received legends, and diminished the dignity of tragedy by depriving it of its ideal character, and by bringing it down to the level of every-day life. His dialogue was garrulous and colloquial, wanting in heroic dignity, and frequently frigid through misplaced philosophical disquisitions. Yet in spite of all these faults Euripides has many beauties, and is particularly remarkable for pathos, so that Aristotle calls him "the most tragic of poets."