Page:History of Greece Vol II.djvu/328

 gi2 HISTORY OF GREECE. perhaps in the direction which the Herakleid legend describes, by warriors entering Peloponnesus across the narrow mouth of the Corinthian gulf, through the aid or invitation of those ^Etolian settlers who at the same time colonized Elis. The early and intimate connection (on which I shall touch presently) be- tween Sparta and the Olympic games as administered by the Eleians, as well as the leading part ascribed to Lykurgus in the constitution of the solemn Olympic truce, tend to strengthen such a persuasion. In considering the early affairs of the Dorians in Peloponnesus, we are apt to have our minds biased, first, by the Herakleid legend, which imparts to them an impressive, but deceitful, epical unity ; next, by the aspect of the later and better-known history, which presents the Spartan power as unquestionably preponder- ant, and Argos only as second by a long interval. But the first view (as I have already remarked) which opens to us, of real Grecian history, a little before 776 B. c., exhibits Argos with its alliance or confederacy of neighboring cities colonized from itself, as the great seat of Dorian power in the peninsula, and Sparta as an outlying state of inferior consequence. The recollection of this state of things lasted after it had ceased to be a reality, and kept alive pretensions on the part of Argos to the headship of the Greeks as a matter of right, which she became quite inca- pable of sustaining either by adequate power or by statesmanlike sagacity. The growth of Spartan power was a succession of en- croachments upon Argos. 1 How Sparta came constantly to gain upon Argos will be matter for future explanation : at present, it is sufficient to remark, that the ascendency of Argos was derived not exclusively from her own territory, but came in part from her position as metropolis of an alliance of autonomous neighboring cities, all Dorian and all colonized from herself, and this was an element of poAver 1 See Herodot. vii. 148. The Argeians say to the Lacedaemonians, in refer ence to the chief command of the Greeks Kalrot Kara ye rb dinaiov yivec flat rrjv riyeuovirjv tuiiruv, etc. Schweighauser and others explain the point by reference to the command of Agamemnon ; but this is at best only a part of the foundation of their claim : they had a more recent historical reality to plead also : compare Strabo, viii. p. 37f.