The Fall of the Athenian Empire-(A New History of the Peloponnesian War) Donald Kagan - (1987)

248 -THE FALL OF THE ATHENIAN EMPIRE
ceived from Italy and Sicily had been much less than expected, and
the revolution in Syracuse deprived them of Hermocrates, the most
fervent and ablest of the allied generals, raising questions about the
quality of Syracusan support in the future. 5 The Spartans also appear
to have lost enough men to the Athenians as prisoners to make them
eager for a peace that would allow their exchange and return. 6
Under these circumstances, the Spartans, in violation of their treaty
with Persia, decided to negotiate for peace with Athens. 7 The chief of
the mission was Endius, who had been part of the embassy that had
failed to prevent the Athenian alliance with Argos in 420. As ephor
for the year 413/12, he had collaborated with Alcibiades in persuading
the Spartans to work with Tissaphernes in Ionia. 8 This, and his old
family friendship with Alcibiades, may have been important recommendations
for his role in the negotiations, but Alcibiades was in the
east, and other men would influence the Athenian decision. Perhaps
he was chosen because he represented the Spartan faction favoring
accommodation or perhaps because he was thought to be an expert in
Athenian affairs. • Diodorus reports Endius' statement of the Spartan
proposal as follows: "We wish to make peace with you, men of Athens,
and that each side should keep the cities it now controls but abandon
the garrisons it holds in the other's territory, ransoming prisoners, one
Athenian for one Laconian. " 10
The Athenians, no doubt, would have been glad to abandon Pylos
in exchange for peace and Decelea and to return prisoners, but to
accept the status quo in the empire was a different matter. Even after
Cyzicus the Spartans controlled Rhodes, Miletus, Ephesus, Chios,
5
8.2.3; Xen. 1.1.27-]I.
6
0n this occasion and again in 408/7 (Androtion, FGrH Ill, 324, Fr. 44) the Spartans
came to Athens with a request for the exchange of prisoners. Lewis (Sparta and Persia,
126) says: "It looks as if the number of Spartiates in Athenian hands may once again
have risen to the point where there was strong internal pressure for an arrangement
that would bring the boys home. As in the period from 425 to 42 1, this can have been
a factor which dwarfed all more general considerations." That seems a stronger state~
ment than the evidence warrants, but the desire to recover their men in Athenian hands
clearly was an important concern of the Spartans.
7
Diod. 13.52·2; Nepos, Ale. s;Justin 5.4; Philochorus, FGrH Ill, p8, Fr. 139, 140.
8
5-44i 8.6.3 and 12.
9
Lewis, Sparta and Persia, 114, n. 44·
10 Diod. 1 3· 52. 3· I agree with Lewis (Sparta and Persia, 1 14 and n. 46) that the speech
of Endius reponed by Diodorus is unlikely to be authentic, but there is no reason to
doubt the accuracy of his account of the peace terms. The narrative, as Lewis suggests,
may well derive from the Hel/enica Oxyrbynchia, but I am less impressed by the similarity
he sees between Diod.q.sJ.I and Hell. Oxy. 6.J.