The Life of Alcibiades
A volume in the series
Cornell Studies in Classical Philology
Edited by Frederick M. Ahl, Charles Brittain, Kevin Clinton,
David P. Mankin, Sturt W. Manning, Alan J. Nussbaum,
Hayden Pelliccia, Pietro Pucci, Hunter R. Rawlings III,
Eric Rebillard, Jeffrey S. Rusten, Barry S. Strauss
A list of titles in this series is available at www.cornellpress.cornell.edu .
The Life of Alcibiades
Dangerous Ambition and
the Betrayal of Athens
Jacqueline de Romilly
Translated by
Elizabeth Trapnell Rawlings
Cornell University Press
Ithaca and London
Original French edition, Alcibiade, ou, Les dangers de l'ambition .
Copyright © Éditions de Fallois, 1995.
English-language translation and translator’s preface copyright © 2019
by Cornell University
All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review, this book, or
parts thereof, must not be reproduced in any form without permission in
writing from the publisher. For information, address Cornell University
Press, Sage House, 512 East State Street, Ithaca, New York 14850. Visit
our website at cornellpress.cornell.edu.
First published 2019 by Cornell University Press
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Romilly, Jacqueline de, author. | Rawlings, Elizabeth, translator.
Title: The life of Alcibiades : dangerous ambition and the betrayal
of Athens / Jacqueline de Romilly ; translated by Elizabeth Trapnell
Rawlings.
Other titles: Alcibiade. English
Description: Ithaca : Cornell University Press, 2019. | Series: Cornell
studies in classical philology | Includes bibliographical references and
indexes.
Identifi ers: LCCN 2018059296 (print) | LCCN 2018060257 (ebook) |
ISBN
9781501739965 (pdf) | ISBN 9781501739972 (epub/mobi) |
ISBN 9781501719752 | ISBN 9781501719752 (cloth)
Subjects: LCSH: Alcibiades. | Statesmen—Greece—Athens—Biography. |
Generals—Greece—Athens—Biography. | Greece—Foreign relations—
To 146 B.C. | Greece—History—Peloponnesian War, 431–404 B.C.
Classifi cation: LCC DF230.A4 (ebook) | LCC DF230.A4 R6613 2019
(print) | DDC 938.05/092 [B]—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018059296
Cover illustration: François-André Vincent, Alcibiade recevant les leçons
de Socrate, 1777.
For Bernard de Fallois, as a token of gratitude and friendship
Contents
Translator’s Preface ix
Author’s Preface xi
Chronology xix
1. Richly Endowed
1
2. Insults and Scandals
15
First Interlude: Alcibiades between Two Lifestyles
31
3. Political Debut: The Argive Alliance
35
4. The Grand Design
52
5. The Scandals
70
6. Exile: Defending Treason
89
7. In Asia Minor
104
8. With the Athenians on Samos
123
viii Contents
Second Interlude: Alcibiades between Two Historians
137
9. A Triumphal Return
141
10. Slightly More Than One Hundred Days
154
11. A Final Appearance
166
12. Repercussions
178
Conclusion 191
Index 201
Translator’s Preface
Jacqueline de Romilly’s lifelong contributions to ancient Greek literature
and history made her a major fi gure in French culture. In 1973 she became
chair of Greek at the Collège de France, the fi rst woman nominated to this
distinguished institution. In 1988, she was elected to the Académie Fran-
çaise as its second female member. In her later years she became famous
in France for her ardent advocacy of classical education for all. Romilly
(1913–2010) was well known on both sides of the Atlantic as an intellec-
tual and cultural critic and served as A. D. White Professor-at-Large at
Cornell University from 1974 to1980.
I was drawn to Romilly’s work in 2010, when I undertook the trans-
lation of her seminal book Histoire et raison chez Thucydide , fi rst pub-
lished in Paris in 1956. That study altered the course of scholarship
on Thucydides’s history of the Peloponnesian War by revealing the au-
thor’s rhetorical and literary artfulness, the means by which he refi ned
and shaped the “facts” of history. The title chosen for my translation,
The Mind of Thucydides (Cornell University Press, 2012), aptly captures
Romilly’s purpose and achievement.
x Translator’s
Preface
Alcibiades is a quite different kind of work, a biography of the mete-
oric career of the egomaniacal fi gure who dominated Greek politics and
the Peloponnesian War from 416 to 404 BCE. It is a product of Romilly’s
superb scholarship and of her lifelong effort to acquaint the public with
the pertinence of the ancient world to contemporary political and cultural
life. To appeal to a wider audience, Romilly composed this book, which
was published in Paris in 1995, in an informal style that would arrest
attention and enable her readers to see Alcibiades’s charismatic personal-
ity in full. She wanted her contemporaries to appreciate the dangers his
singular character posed to Athens, Sparta, and Persia, all of which fell
under his spell and granted him authoritative roles in their policymaking.
Although this is a work of history, it often reads like a novel.
But Romilly evinces her usual acumen and care in the research she con-
ducted for this book. She plumbs and critiques the sources for Alcibiades’s
life, including Thucydides, Plato, Andocides, Lysias, Xenophon, Isocrates,
Plutarch, Athenaeus, and Diodorus. On the one hand, she reproduces
from the later biographers numerous anecdotes from Alcibiades’s youth
in order to paint his character, while acknowledging their historical unreli-
ability; on the other hand, she critically evaluates the contemporary and
more authentic portraits drawn by Thucydides and Plato, and accords
them respect, but not complete credibility. Numerous footnotes disclose
her sources to the reader, thus making her biography an unusual blend of
erudition and accessibility.
Romilly’s treatment of Alcibiades’s youthful insolence and arrogant
disregard for social norms, and of his later athletic, fi nancial, and religious
scandals, was informed by her perception of events in her native France
in the mid-1990s. Several times she refers to contemporary scandals in
French politics that mirror Alcibiades’s outrages in fi fth-century Greece.
Her central lesson is that a charismatic, amoral, and narcissistic leader
/> imposes enormous risks on a democratic state. Few commentators are as
well qualifi ed as Romilly to warn of the public dangers inherent in such
reckless individuals. To say that twenty-fi rst-century readers of this biog-
raphy are likely to fi nd in it parallels to today’s political environment is to
understate the case.
Author’s Preface
The life of Alcibiades is one of astonishing journeys and adventures. As a
young man, he was adopted by Pericles and beloved by Socrates. He was
at the center of all political activity at the end of the fi fth century BCE.
Driven by ambition and endowed with uncommon abilities, he dominated
politics fi rst in Athens, then in Sparta, then in the Persian satrapies. He
experienced highs and lows worthy of a Greek tragedy. From a position
of power over all of Athens, he was suddenly forced to fl ee from the city
that had condemned him to death. He returned as a savior, honored and
acclaimed, only to be exiled once again, and ultimately assassinated, by
order of the state, in a village in upper Phrygia. Following him every-
where, from city to city, from Sicily to Lydia, from one campaign to an-
other, was the persistent whiff of scandal.
Moreover, a colorful adventurer, he did not live in ordinary times. The
Peloponnesian War, in which he played a leading role, was one of the
most important turning points in Greek history. It had begun at a moment
when Athens was at the very peak of power and infl uence. It ended in
xii Author’s
Preface
utter defeat. Athens lost both its empire and fl eet, thus ending a century
of tragic greatness and glory. Alcibiades had presided over all the impor-
tant decisions, on both sides. He therefore bore, undeniably, responsibility
for the disastrous results. And he died in the same year as Athens’ de-
feat. It is as if, from every angle, his personal experience was interwoven
with the crucial moments in Athenian history. It is for this reason, then,
that he held the attention of and inspired contemplation by the greatest
minds of his time. The names of Pericles and Socrates appear above in the
opening lines for good reason: Pericles gave his name to the century, and
Socrates was the founder of Western philosophy. Moreover, Alcibiades fi g-
ures in the work of the greatest historian of the time, Thucydides, as well
as works of Plato and Xenophon, the historical works and the memoirs
on Socrates. Other authors contain allusions or references to Alcibiades,
including Aristophanes and Euripides. Even after his death, the orators
Isocrates and Lysias argued about the role and character of Alcibiades.
There was, in fact, an Alcibiades problem. An orphan and the ward of
Pericles, he seems to have pursued a political path contrary to that of his
teacher. Over twenty-fi ve years, that change could be seen to correspond
to the ruin of Athens. Was there a connection? And if so, what was it?
Was it simply a generational issue of personality and temperament? Or
was there a broader decline in civic purpose and morality in political af-
fairs? And did this decline refl ect, or cause, a crisis in the democracy and
its workings? If the latter hypothesis is correct, as was thought at the time,
then it is of paramount interest to us and to all those who hold dear the
idea of democracy.
We might say that the life of Alcibiades brought out two political prob-
lems that were apparent as early as the fi fth century and are still current
in today’s world.
First, his life embodied Athenian imperialism, in its most extreme and
dominant form and in the lack of prudence that led to its ruin. Any refl ec-
tion on the mentality of conquest benefi ts from considering his example,
which the analyses of Thucydides clarify.
In addition, Alcibiades embodied, and carried to its extreme, the very
picture of personal ambition overtaking the public interest. In this he il-
lustrated Thucydides’s analysis showing how the successors of Pericles,
failing to succeed on their merits as he had done, were led to fl atter the
people and resort to personal schemes, harmful to the public interest.
Author’s
Preface xiii
Thus, anyone thinking about the problems of democracy in general will
profi t by looking at the improbable adventures of Alcibiades in light of the
assessment of Thucydides or the fourth-century philosophers.
Alcibiades is a unique case, and well beyond the ordinary. But he is also
an exemplar for every age, a living example. For this reason, we fi nd so
many details in common with our own time. In the life of Alcibiades, we
recognize the ambition and the power struggles; the athletic victories that
contributed to the popularity of leaders, and that led to fi nancial miscon-
duct. We recognize the “affairs” by which all celebrities are compromised.
And we recognize popular reversals of one kind or another. At times, we
almost have the impression that the famous text in which Thucydides
contrasts Pericles with his successors could apply equally to a contrast
between General de Gaulle and his successors.
It is important to guard against such comparisons, for they are always
false. One senses, however, that the case of Alcibiades assumes greater
value in the degree to which it relates to crises hitting very close to home.
That is why I was moved to write this book.
Alcibiades—I feel I have always known him. One cannot study fi fth-
century Athens, as I have all my life, without encountering him at every
turn. One cannot return year after year to Thucydides and Athenian impe-
rialism without growing attached to the man who was a major character
in Thucydides’s history and who personifi ed the most ambitious aspect of
Athenian imperialism. In addition, I was a student of Jean Hatzfeld at the
École des Hautes Études at the time when he devoted himself, year after
year, to elucidating, for the benefi t of a few advanced students, each of the
great issues of the period. That is true erudition. For two or three years, I
chose to devote myself, at the École Normale Supérieure de Sèvres, to ex-
plication of the texts on Alcibiades. It was always Alcibiades. But I would
never have started writing this book had I not been struck one day, to my
surprise, by the overwhelming sense of contemporary relevance attached
to these texts. I began writing at that moment.
These unusual circumstances explain the tone I have adopted in this book.
First, this is not a fi ctional biography. All words spoken by the char-
acters are taken from the texts. There are no dialogues, reconstructed
encounters, or inner thoughts attributed to anyone. My work is that of
a Hellenist, trained to respect the sources, and it is therefore based on
xiv Author’s
Preface
rigorous scholarship. In citing, and saying whom I cite, I intend to inject
an element of authenticity. Besides, I admire these texts, and I love citing
them, not only as a sort of validation, but for the pleasure of doing so,
and also in order to have them admired, appreciated for their subtlety and
<
br /> depth. I have allowed Plutarch, Thucydides, and Plato to speak for them-
selves. One may be surprised at times by the foreignness of their style, but
these texts bear the mark of authenticity; and we can know the real Alcibi-
ades only through these texts.
In general, I have indicated the problems resulting from disparities
among these texts and from the uncertainty they create for scholars. That
is all part of the search for the truth. And it seems to me that sometimes
the research itself is an adventure, one that adds to our fascination with
the political adventure—that of Alcibiades.
So, one asks, is this another “Greek” book, intended for Hellenists?
Not at all.
Most Hellenists know all about Alcibiades. I have written this book for
those who don’t know anything about him, or only very little. And I have
tried not to disappoint them.
I have been selective; I have edited and condensed.
Moreover, I have eliminated all details of interest only to scholars;
these can be readily found in the works of experts. I have also eliminated
a lot of proper names. I know, from experience with Russian novels, how
distracting unfamiliar names can be. And they present an aspect of tech-
nicality to untrained eyes that can be discouraging. As often as possible I
have said “an adversary,” or “the Lacedaemonian general,” or “a friend
of Alcibiades,” rather than naming the individual. I know their names of
course. They are known to many Hellenists. Again, for anyone who wants
to know, these can be found and fi lled in. And I hope the reader will ben-
efi t from these omissions.
Conversely, I have sought, whenever referring to institutions or po-
litical situations, to give some word of explanation about them: this may
involve a position, like that of general, or a particular custom, like ostra-
cism, or something else, the name of which may be familiar but not the
precise meaning.
Although the author of this book may be a professor, she has the ben-
efi t of introducing a unique individual, through whom the texts, and the
culture to which he belonged, become all the more vivid.
Author’s
Preface xv
It is normal for the author of a biography to cite the sources from which
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