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

SPARTA'S RIPOSTE 71
sides again. Recent events had compelled the Athenian renegade to
turn his coat once more and to seek safety with the Persian satrap.
Some time before the battle of Miletus an Athenian raid on Panormus
killed the Spartan commander Chalcideus, depriving Alcibiades of a
close colleague. 7 Thucydides says that suspicion against Alcibiades
arose among the Peloponnesians "after the death of Chalcideus and
the battle of Miletus. "' These events were probably no more than a
few weeks apart, and Thucydides seems to imply that the death of
Alcibiades' influential ally allowed suspicions among the Peloponnesian
forces to be bruited about publicly until soon after the battle of Miletus,
when Alcibiades joined Tissaphernes.
About the same time as the battle of Miletus a new board of ephors
took office in Sparta. 9 The departure of Endius from the ephorate
deprived Alcibiades of urgently needed support, for as Thucydides
emphasizes, "he was a personal enemy of Agis and for other reasons
did not inspire confidence.'"• His origins, his personality, and his
previous record are perhaps enough to explain why he was the object
of distrust in Sparta and needed friends in high places to protect him
there. It is less clear why the Peloponnesian-soldiers and sailors in
lonia should have come to suspect him of treason, for it was surely at
their instigation that a letter was sent from Sparta to Astyochus ordering
the navarch to kill Alcibiades."
Thucydides does not give any reasons for the suspicion, apart from
the general sense that Alcibiades was untrusrworthy, but it is not hard
to imagine how such thoughts came to be directed against such a man.
Results of the expectations he had raised had been very disappointing.
The general rebellion that was expected in the Athenian Empire had
been repressed almost as soon as it had begun. Far from serving as a
major base of operations and providing important support, Chios was
78.24· I.
88·45·•·
'11usolt (GG 111:2, 1437) dates the change of ephors about the beginning of October.
Both he (1432) and Andrewes (HCT V, 185) date the battle of Miletus in late September
or early October.
108.45 .I.
nHatzfeld (Alcibiade, 225, n. 7) has rightly understood Thucydides to mean that the
decision in Sparta was based on complaints from the allied forces in lonia, although
the text is difficult, as Andrewes (HCT V, 95) points out. The severity of the sentence
makes it clear that Alcibiades was suspected of a capital crime such as treason. Busolt
(GG 111:2, 1437) has no doubt that this was the charge or that Alcibiades was innocent
of it.