Page:History of Greece Vol II.djvu/435

 DISTRIBUTION OF LACONIA. 419 BO tlita it would include all the southern portion of Peloponne- sus, hum Thyrea, on the Argolic gulf, to the southern bank of the river Nedon, in its course into the Ionian sea. But Laconia, more strictly so called, was distinguished from Messenia, and was understood to designate the portion of the above-mentioned territory which Jay to the east of Mount Taygetus. The con- quest of Messenia by the Spartans we shall presently touch upon ; but that of Laconia proper is very imperfectly narrated to us. Down to the reign of Teleklus, as has been before re- marked, Amyklae, Pharis, and Geronthree, were still Achaean : in the reign of that prince they were first conquered, and the Achaeans either expelled or subjugated. It cannot be doubted that AmykliB had been previously a place of consequence : in point of heroic antiquity and memorials, this city, as well as Therapnae, seems to have surpassed Sparta. And the war of the Spartans against it is represented as a struggle of some mo- ment, indeed, in those times, the capture of any walled city was tedious and difficult. Timomachus, an -ZEgeid from Thebes," who sends to him " une sorte de ttibleau statistiquc du Magne, ou sont enu- mere's 125 bourgs ou villages renfermans 4,913 feux, et pouvans fournir 10,- 000 combattans, dont 4,000 armes, et 6,000 sans armes (between Calamata and Capo di Magna)." (Me'moires de 1' Academic des Inscriptions, torn. xv. 1 842, p. 329. Me'moire de M. Berger Xivrey.) This estimate is not far removed from that of Colonel Leake, towards the beginning of the present century, who considers that there were then in Mani (the same territory) one hundred and thirty towns and villages; and this too in a state of society exceedingly disturbed and insecure, where private feuds and private towers, or pyrghi, for defence, were universal, and in parts of which, Colonel Leake says, " I see men preparing the ground for cotton, with a dagger and pistols at their girdles. This, it seems, is the ordinary armor of the cultivator when there is no particular suspicion of danger: the shepherd is almost always armed with a musket." " The Maniotes reckon their population at thirty thousand, and their muskets at ten thousand." (Leake, Travels in Morea, vol. i. ch. vii. pp. 243, 263-266.) Now, under the dominion of Sparta, all Laconia doubtless enjoyed com- plete internal security, so that the idea of the cultivator tilling his land in arms would be unheard of. Reasoning upon the basis of what has just been Btated about the Maniote population and number of townships, one hundred trohetf, for all Laconia, is a very moderate computation. 1 Aristot. Aaxuv. TLohiTeia, ap. Schol. Pindar. Isthm. vii. 18. I agree with M. Boeckh, that Pindar himself identifies this march of the