Page:History of Greece Vol X.djvu/184

 162 HISTORY OF GREECE. able property ; but their town was destroyed, and its territory again annexed to Thebes. The unhappy fugitives were constrained for the second time to seek refuge at Athens, where they were again kindly received, and restored to the same qualified right of citizenship as they had enjoyed prior to the peace of Antalkidas. 1 It was not merely with Platcea, but also with Thespite, that Thebes was now meddling. Mistrusting the dispositions of the Thespians, she constrained them to demolish the fortifications of their town ; 2 as she had caused to be done fifty-two years before, after the victory of Delium, 3 on suspicion of leanings favorable to Athens. Such proceedings on the part of the Thebans in Bceotia excited strong emotion at Athens ; where the Plataeans not only appeared 1 Diodor. xv, 47. Pausanias (ix, 1, 3) places this capture of Plataea in the third year (count- ing the years from midsummer to midsummer) before the battle of Leuktra; or in the year of the archon Asteius at Athens ; which seems to me the true date, though Mr. Clinton supposes it (without ground, I think) to be contradicted by Xenophon. The year of the archon Asteius reaches from midsummer 373 to 372 B. c. It is in the latter half of the year that I sup- pose Platsea to have been taken. 8 I infer this from Isokrates, Or. xiv, (Plataic.) s. 21-38 ; compare also sect. 10. The Platsean speaker accuses the Thebans of having destroyed the walls of some Boeotian cities (over and above what they had done to Platsea,) and I venture to apply this to Thespiae. Xenophon indeed states that the Thespians were at this very period treated exactly like the Pla taeans ; that is, driven out of Boeotia, and their town destroyed ; except that they had r.ot the same claim on Athens (Hellen. vi, 3, 1 cnroMdas yevofievovs : compare also vi, 3, 5). Diodorus also (xv, 46) speaks of the Thebans as having destroyed Thespiae. But against this, I gather, from the Plataic Oration of Isokrates, that the Thespians were not in the same plight with the Plataeans when that oration was delivered ; that is, they were not expelled collectively out of Boeotia. Moreover, Pausanias also expressly says that the Thespians were present in Bceotia at the time of the battle of Leuktra, and that they were expelled shortly afterwards. Pausanias at the same time gives a distinct story, about the conduct of the Thespians, which it would not be reasonable to reject (ix, 13, 3; ix, 14, 1). I believe therefore that Xenophon has spoken inaccurately in saying that the Thespians were ujr62.5ef before the battle of Leuktra. It is quite possi ble that they might have sent supplications to Athens (//cerevovraf Xen. Hell, vi, 3, 1 ) in consequence of the severe mandate to demolish their walls. 3 Thucyd. ir, 133.