Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume II.djvu/277

 MANTINEIA. neians formcil an alliance ■with Argos, Elis, and Athens, in B.C. 421, and thus became involved in war with Sparta. (Thuc. v. 29, 33, 47.) This war was brought to a close by the decisive battle fou£rht near Mantineia, in June, 418, in which the Argives, Mantineians, and Athenians were defeated by the Lacedaemonians under Agis. This battle was fought to the S. of Mantineia, between the city and the frontiers of Tegea, and is the first of the five great battles bearing the name of Mantineia. The Mantineians now concluded a peace with Sparta, renouncing their dominion over the districts in Ar- cadia, which they had conquered. (Thuc. v. 65, seq., 81.) Slantineia continued an unwilling ally of Sparta for the next 33 years ; but in the second year after the peace of Antalcidas, which had restored to the Spartans a great part of their former power, they resolved to crush for ever this obnoxious city. Ac- cordingly, they required the Mantineians to raze their walls ; and upon the refusal of the latter, they marched against the city with an army under the command of their king Agesipolis (b. c. 385), alleging that the truce for 30 years had expired, which had been concluded between the two states after the battle of 418. The Mantineians were defeated in battle, and took refuge in their city, prepared to withstand a siege; but Agesipolis having raised an embankment across the river Ophis, which flowed through Mantineia, forced back the waters of the river, and thus caused an inundation around the walls of the city. These walls, being built of unbaked bricks, soon began to give way; and the Mantineians, fearing that the city would be taken by assault, were obliged to j'ield to the terms of the Spartans, wiio required that the inhabitants should quit the city, and be dispersed among the villages, from the coalescence of which the city had been originally formed. (Xen. Ilell. v. 2. §§6, 7; Diod. XV. 5 ; Ephorus, ap. Harpocrat. s. v. Mavriviuv SioiKtcrij.6i; Pol. iv. 27; Fans. viii. 8. § 7, seq.) Of the forces of Mantineia shortly before this time we have an account from the orator Lysias, who says that the military population or citizens of Man- tineia were not less than 3000, which will give 13,000 for the free population of the Mantineian territory. (Lysias, ap. Dioni/s. p. 531; Chnton, F. H. vol. ii. p. 416.) The Mantineians did not long remain in this dis- persed condition. When the Spartan supremacy was overthrown by the battle of Leuctra in 371, they again assembled together, and rebuilt their city. They took care to exclude the river from the new city, and to make the stone substructions of the walls higher than they had been previously. (Xen. Ilell. vi. 5. § 3; Pans. v. 8. § 10; Leake, Morea, vol. iii. p. 73.) The Mantineians took an active part in the formation of the Arcadian confederacy, and in the foundation of Megalopolis, which followed imme- diately after the restoration of their own city; and one of their own citizens, Lycomedes, was the chief promoter of the scheme. But a few years afterwards the MantiiKians, for reasons which are not distinctly mentioned, quarrelled with the supreme Arcadian government, and formed an alhance with their in- veterate enemies the Spartans. In order to put down this new coalition, Epaminondas marched into the Peloponnesus; and JIantineia was again the scene of another great battle (the second of the five alluded to above), in which the Spartans were de- feated, but which was rendered still more memo- MANTINEIA. 261 rable by 'the death of Epaminondas. (Xen. IlelL vii. 5 ; Diod. xv. 84.) The site of this battle is de- scribed below. The third and fourth battles of Man- tineia are only incidentally mentioned by the an- cient writers : the third was fought in 295, when Demetrius Poliorcetes defeated Archidamus and the Spartans (Plut. Demetr. 35) ; the fourth in 242, when Aratus and the Achaeans defeated the Spar- tans under Agis, the latter falling in the battle. (Paus. viii. 10. § 5, seq.) Mantineia continued to be one of the most power- ful towns of Arcadia down to the time of the Achaean League. It at first joined this league ; but it subsequently deserted it, and, together with Orchomenus and Tegea, became a member of the Aetolian confederacy. These three cities at a later time renounced their alliance with the Aetolians, and entered into a close union with Sparta, about B. c. 228. This step was the immediate cause of the war between the Achaeans and the Spartans, usually called the Cleomenic War. In 226, Aratus surprised Mantineia, and compelled the city to re- ceive an Achaean garrison. The Mantineians soon afterwards expelled the Achaeans, and again joined the Spartans ; but the city was taken a second time, in 222, by Antigonus Doson, whom the Achaeans had invited to their assistance. It was now treated with great severity. It was abandoned to plunder, its citizens were sold as slaves, and its name changed to Antigoneia (^P^VTiyovna), in compliment to the Macedonian monarch (Pol. ii. 57, seq.; Plut. Arat, 45 ; Paus. viii. 8. § 11). In 207, the plain of Mantineia was the scene of a fifth great battle, between the Achaean forces, commanded by Philo- poemen, and the Lacedaemonians, under the tyrant Machanidas, in which the latter was defeated and slain. An account of this battle is given by Poly- bius, from whom we learn that the Achaean army occupied the entire breadth of the plain S. of the city, and that their light-armed troops occupied the hill to the E. of the city called Alesium by Pausanias. The Lacedaemonians were drawn up opposite to the Achaeans ; and the two armies thus occupied the same position as in the first battle of ]Ianti- neia, fought in the Peloponnesian War. (Pol. xi. 1 1.) The Mantineians were the only Arcadian people who fought on the side of Augustus at the battle of Actium. (Paus. viii. 8. § 12.) The city continued to bear the name of Antigoneia till the time of Hadrian, who restored to it its ancient appellation, and conferred upon it other marks of his favour, in honour of his favourite, Antinous, because the Bi- thynians, to whom Antinous belonged, claimed descent from the Mantineians. (Paus. viii. 8. § 12, viii. 9. § 7.) The territoiy of Mantineia was bounded on the W. by Mt. Maenalus, and on the E. by Mt. Artemi- sium, which separated it from Argolis. Its north- ern frontier was a low narrow ridge, separating it from Orchomenia ; its southern frontier, which divided it from Tegeatis, was formed by a narrow part of the valley, hemmed in by a projecting ridge from Mt. Maenalus on the one side, and by a similar ridge from Mt. Artemisius on the other. (See below.) The territory of Mantineia forms part of the plain now called the plain of TripoUtzd, from the modern towm of this name, lying between the ancient Mantineia and Tegea, and which is the principal place in the district. This plain is about 25 English miles in length, with a breadth varying from 1 to 8, and includes, besides the territory of JIantineia, that ot 8 3