Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 1.djvu/676

 In 356, Byzantium, along with Rhodes and Chios, united with the newly-flourishing commonwealth of Cos, and Mausolus king of Caria, in an endeavour to throw off the Athenian dominion: an engagement which was to have taken place by sea, was prevented by a storm. (Diod. xvi. 21.) In 340, the Athenians, urged on by Demosthenes, sent succours to Byzantium, which was besieged by Philip; the combined fleet under the command of Chares met Amyntas and the Macedonian ships, and were defeated. In the following year Chares was superseded by Phocion, when the Athenians behaved with such moderation to their allies, and showed so much courage against the besiegers, that Philip was compelled to raise the siege. (Diod. xvi. 77; Plut. Phoc. 14.) During this memorable attack, on a dark night when the Macedonians were on the point of seizing upon the town, a light appeared in the heavens and revealed to the inhabitants their danger. (Steph. B. s. v. ; Eustath. ad Dionys. 143.) Hesychius the Milesian, who tells the same story, adds that an image in honour of this interference was erected to Torch-bearing Hecate. The crescent,which is found on Byzantine coins (Mionnet, Descr. des Med. vol. i. p. 378), and which was adopted by the Turks as their device after the capture of Constantinople (comp. Von Hammer, Gesch. der Osman, vol. i. p. 93) is supposed to commemorate the portent. This repulse to the successful career of Philip was one of the proudest feats of the great orator, and in his speech upon the crown Demosthenes often recurs to it. The Byzantines, in gratitude for the valuable assistance they had received, decreed to the Athenians the right of isopolity, the extraordinary privilege of precedence at games and public ceremonies, with exemption from compulsory liturgies. The decree, which with all the original Dorisms is preserved in Demosthenes (de Cor. p. 255), directed that in perpetual memory of the benefit, 3 statues each 16 cubits high, representing the people of Byzantium and Perinthus crowning the Athenians, should be placed in a public part of the city.

The Byzantines were afterwards engaged in perpetual warfare with the neighbouring barbarians, and were unable to keep them off either by resistance or tribute. To crown the other evils of war, their harvests were either carried off or destroyed by the enemy, till, in 279, they agreed to pay the Gauls a yearly tribute of 3000, 5000, and 10,000 pieces of gold, and at last the large sum of 80 talents, on condition that their lands should not be ravaged. (Polyb. iv. 46; Liv. xxxviii. 16; Böckh, Econ. of Athens, p. 595, trans.) Their sufferings in this respect compelled them to have recourse to many extraordinary measures for procuring money, and finally to the imposition of the transit duties which involved them in the war with Rhodes. Still, during this time, while suffering the penalty of Tantalus (Polyb. l. c.), they enjoyed municipal independence. (Diod. xix. 77.) In this war Byzantium was supported by Attalus, king of Pergamus. Prusias, king of Bithynia, was a partizan of Rhodes, and the Byzantines endeavoured to set up Tiboetes, an uncle of Prusias, as rival for his throne. Prusias seized on their Asiatic possessions, while the Thracians pressed hard upon them on the European side; and in 219 a peace, under the mediation of the Gallo-Grecian king Cavarus, was concluded on very unfavourable terms for Byzantium. (Polyb. iv. 46—52.) While Rome was contending against the pseudo-Philip of Macedon, Antiochus, and Mithridates, it granted toByzantium, for good services rendered on the occasion, the rank of a free and confederate city. Disputes arose, and an appeal was made to Rome, which resulted in a decree, proposed by Clodius, and put in force by Piso, who exhibited himself rather as a conqueror than an ally and magistrate. (Cic. de Prov. Consul. 2—4; Tac. Ann. xii. 62.) It appears that Claudius remitted the tribute Byzantium had to pay, for five years, in consequence of the losses of the Thracian war (Tac. Ann. xii. 63), and that Vespasian stripped it of its privileges, and reduced it to the condition of a Roman province. (Suet. Vesp. 8.) In the civil wars between Severus and Pescennius Niger, Byzantium took the part of the latter, and, after a resistance of three years, was taken in 196. Severus treated the inhabitants with his usual indifference to human life or suffering. The famous walls of massive square stones, so well fastened together by iron bolts that the whole seemed to be one block, were levelled with the earth. The soldiers and magistrates were put to death, the property of the citizens confiscated, and the town itself, deprived of all political existence, made over to the Perinthians. (Dion Cass. lxxiv. 6—14; Herodian, iii. 1—7; Zosim. i. 8.) Severus afterwards relented, and, visiting Byzantium, embellished the town with magnificent baths, porticoes round the Hippodrome, and other buildings. The name of Augusta Antonina was given it, in honour of Antoninus Bassianus. (Suid. s. v. ; Zosim. ii. 30; Cedren. p. 252.) Caracalla restored to the inhabitants their rights and franchises. (Spartian. Caracall. 1.) It is remarked by Gibbon (Decl. and Fall, vol. i. p. 205), that the charge against Severus of having deprived the Roman people of the strongest bulwark against the barbarians of Pontus and Asia, was but too well justified when, in the succeeding age, the fleets of the Goths covered the Euxine, and passed through the undefended Bosporus into the centre of the Mediterranean. The soldiers of Gallienus massacred most of the citizens, and not one old family remained in later times, except those who had previously left the town. (Trebell. Poll. Gallien. 6.) Under Claudius II. the remainder of the Byzantines fought bravely against the Goths. (Trebell. Poll. Claud. 9.) In the civil wars which succeeded the abdication of Diocletian, the fortifications of Byzantium had been strengthened: Licinius, after the battle of Adrianople, retired to this stronghold; Constantine pursued the siege so vigorously, by constructing mounds of an equal height with the ramparts, and erecting towers upon their foundation, from which the besieged were galled by large stones and darts hurled by engines, that the town at length surrendered.

The constitution of Byzantium was at first royal; though there is some doubt about this, as Hesychius the Milesian calls Dineus general of the Byzantines. (Müller, Dor. vol. ii. p. 174, trans.) It afterwards became an aristocracy,—the native inhabitants, the Bithynians, being in precisely the same condition as the Helots. (Plutarch. ap. Athen. vi. p. 271.) The oligarchy which succeeded was, in 390, changed into a democracy by Thrasybulus the Athenian; and equal privileges were at the same time probably granted to the new citizens, who, on account of their demands, had been driven from the city by the ancient colonists. (Arist. Pol. v. 2. § 10.) After this the democracy seems to have continued for a long time. (Theopomp. ap. Athen. 12. p. 256.) In the document quoted by Demosthenes (de Cor. l. c.)