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Dromo's Den
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[Up] [Dromo's Den] Themistocles Biography THEMISITOCLES (Lat., from Gk. Themistokles) (c.514-449 B.C.). An Athenian general and statesman, born about 514 B.C., the son of Neocles, an Athenian citizen of middling station and circumstances, and a Carian or Thracian woman. After the battle of Marathon (490 B.C.), when the first invasion of the Persians had been successfully resisted, Thernistocles, with keen foresight, recognized that the final decision of the question of supremacy would come on the sea, and that the only way for the Greeks to be victorious was to have a large fleet. He aimed, therefore, at the development of a strong Athenian navy. To this end he persuaded the Athenians to devote the proceeds arising from the working of the silver mines at Laurion (q.v.), which it was intended to distribute among the citizens at large, to the construction of a strong fleet. He secured the passage of a law that a certain number of new triremes should be built every year. From the time of the expulsion of Aristides by ostracism (483 B.C.), Themistocles controlled the politics of Athens, and in 481 B.C. was made archon eponymus. When it was learned that Xerxes was preparing a powerful armament to invade Greece, and the Athenians had been told by the Delphian oracle to defend themselves with the "wooden wall," Themistocles interpreted this answer as referring to the ships of Athens. At the battle of Artemisium (480 B.C.) Themistocles, as commander of the Athenian fleet, which was the largest in Greece, consented to fight under the Spartan commander, Eurybiades, but it was only through the former's tact and adroit use of bribes that the Greek commanders were finally induced to make a stand in that place. This engagement was indecisive. In the same year, at Salamis (q.v.), was fought the battle which shattered the naval power of Xerxes. Here again Eurybiades was commander in chief, and here again it was owing to Themistocles alone that the Greeks were induced not to retreat to the Isthmus of Corinth, but to give battle in their present position. He threatened, if a separation were now made, that the Athenians would take their women and children and sail to Italy, there to found a new home. Finally, he precipitated the contest, by dispatching to Xerxes a secret message to the effect that, if the Persians wished to crush the Greek fleet, they should advance to the attack without delay, before the Greeks had an opportunity of fleeing. After the battle of Salamis Themistocles was the most important man in Greece. When the Persians had retreated from Greece and the Athenians undertook to restore their city, the Spartans, sending an embassy to Athens, urged the Athenians not to attempt to rebuild the fortifications. Then Themistocles, going on an embassy to Sparta, entertained the Spartans with his false professions, and kept the matter in abeyance till such time as the walls were sufficiently advanced to allow of their being defended. In 471 B.C. he was ostracized and retired to Argos; and finally, to escape being tried for treason, in which, according to some accounts, he was implicated by the correspondence of Pausanias (q.v.), he betook himself in 405 B.C. to the court of Artaxerxes, King of Persia; but, before he would see the King himself, he got permission to wait a year, during which he made himself master of the language and usages of the country. At the end of this time he managed to raise himself so high in the King's favor that, after the Persian fashion, the town of Magnesia was appointed to supply him with bread, Lampsacus with wine, and Myus with other provisions. He lived securely at Magnesia until his death in 449 B.C. Some authorities assert that he poisoned himself. A monument was erected to Themistocles in the market place of Magnesia, and it is said that his bones were secretly taken to Attica, and there burned. His life was written in ancient times by Plutarch and Cornelius Nepos. Consult: Wecklein, Ueber Themistokles (Munich, 1892); Bauer, Themistokles (Merseburg, 1881); and the standard histories of Greece. The New International Encyclopaedia, Vol. XXII (New York: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1920) 177-178. |