The Life of Alcibiades

by Jacqueline de Romilly

  reinforced by wine, was in telling all, making fun of himself; his amorous

  successes protected him from any shame about this—and he was not a

  man to be easily embarrassed.

  Moreover, the story is a nice one: it shows the discovery of another

  meaning of love. I cite it here only because it also shows how unprepared

  for this he was, given his usual behavior.

  Besides, it was undoubtedly too late to change his behavior. Whatever

  may have been the date of the night with Socrates, the Symposium, where

  Alcibiades tells the story, is thought to have taken place in 416. He was

  already involved in political life, actively in pursuit of glory.

  The second incident, the fi nal one, took place at the beginning of that

  brilliant career. It combines great glory with the absence of scruples for

  which we have seen ample evidence.

  Whenever someone wanted to be talked about, to draw attention,

  to get ahead, one of the best ways to do so was to win victories in the

  Insults

  and

  Scandals 27

  Panhellenic Games. The contests that were properly called “athletic” were

  obviously the domain of specialists. However, one could, and often did,

  own a stable of racehorses and compete in the chariot races. Doing so

  won great notoriety: a bit like someone who, today, manages and trains a

  football team to compete in the major competitions. This was a sure way

  of getting oneself into the spotlight and earning the acclaim of the city that

  would celebrate the victories. Add a bit more hype in the fi fth century BCE

  and a bit more of a populist chord in the current era, and the similarity is

  even more striking.

  In the family of the Alcmeonids to which Alcibiades belonged there

  was a tradition of greatness in victories at the Panhellenic Games. He

  wanted to resume that tradition. In 416 he was victorious in not one but

  in several events, an incomparable achievement.

  As Plutarch said soberly, “He gained great notoriety from his stable of

  racehorses and from the number of chariots. No one, either private citi-

  zen or nobleman, had ever, in the history of the Olympics, entered seven

  chariots at once. He alone did it” (11.1).

  By itself this was awe-inspiring. But the result was no less so: Alcibi-

  ades took three prizes, including fi rst and second place.

  As for the third prize Alcibiades won, history is ambivalent: Thucydides

  says that he won fourth, Isocrates says third, a point also made in an ode

  Plutarch attributes to Euripides. 17 It is a nice example of how stories are always simplifi ed for emphasis. Today, if someone wins fi rst prize in Latin

  and second prize in Greek in the general exams, the press will say she won

  fi rst prize in both; I know from experience.

  It was in any case a triumph. Thucydides, Plutarch, Isocrates all men-

  tion it, all agree on that point. The celebrations that followed were unfor-

  gettable. The ode Plutarch attributes to Euripides sets the tone: “Of you

  I wish to sing, son of Cleinias. It is wonderful to win; but what is more

  wonderful is something that no other Greek has done: that is to take fi rst,

  second, and third prizes in the chariot races and to return twice, with ease,

  as the object of the herald’s proclamation.” 18 Many Greek cities showered him with honors: Ephesus offered him a magnifi cently decorated tent,

  17. Thucydides 6.16.2; Isocrates, On the Team of Horses 34; Euripides, in Plutarch 11.3.

  18. Plutarch 11.3; the Life of Demosthenes mentions this ode, noting that he is unsure it is by Euripides, and no one today would attribute the ode to Euripides.

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  2

  Chios gave him food for his horses, and Lesbos gave him wine and food

  for his own table and for the receptions he hosted at Olympia.

  He himself celebrated his victory with all the pomp one would expect.

  Among the events he sponsored was a parade in Olympia, for which the city

  allowed him to borrow gold vases; according to Against Alcibiades, falsely

  attributed to Andocides, Alcibiades used the vases for a private party. But

  he kept them for a procession that took place the next day; it was a proces-

  sion he organized, distinct from the offi cial procession that followed. The

  result: strangers believed the vases belonged to Alcibiades. Many of them,

  seeing the ways in which he acted on his own, “laughed at us when they

  saw that a single man was more powerful than the entire city” (29).

  The brilliance of the victories and celebrations was long remembered.

  All the authors refer to it. We know that there were paintings (cited by

  Athenaeus) and a third-century sculpture mentioned by Pliny. Alcibiades

  is sometimes represented by a quadriga (four-horse chariot). And the lack

  of scruples? It is there, of course, and not only in the incident involving

  the borrowed vases. As usual with this character, shameless carelessness

  was combined with glowing success. In sports, in our own time as well,

  fi nancial affairs are not always strictly proper.

  Alcibiades had a friend, an honest man named Diomedes. Diomedes,

  who also wanted to enter chariot races, heard that there was a fi ne chariot

  in Argos that belonged to the state and was available for sale; he asked the

  very infl uential Alcibiades (who was especially infl uential at Argos, for rea-

  sons we shall soon learn) to buy the chariot “on his own, Diomedes’s, ac-

  count.” Very well! What did Alcibiades do? He bought the chariot . . . and

  kept it! Diomedes was furious, sued, went to court. The speech Against

  Alcibiades that has come down to us in the name of Andocides mentions a

  “stolen” team and a race entered “with horses belonging to someone else”

  (26–27). Indeed, we have seen that Isocrates’s speech about Alcibiades is

  called On the Team of Horses. This is the team involved. The case went

  on a long time. Diomedes’s suit over this incident in 416 was halted with

  Alcibiades’s exile; despite efforts by Diomedes in 408, the case was not

  heard until 396, twenty years after the event. The charge was brought by

  a certain Tisias, who was unaware of Diomedes’s case, 19 and was directed against Alcibiades’s son, who had just attained majority. The improprieties

  19. On this trial, see below, chapter 12.

  Insults

  and

  Scandals 29

  linked to the pursuit of athletic victories can lead to a lot of problems.

  Alcibiades’s son argued, we can be sure, that the race was entirely proper

  and that the suit was an awful conspiracy.

  Nevertheless, a moment of glory unique in the entire fi fth century was

  dulled by shadows that had accumulated consistently in the life of this man.

  All the insolence and scandalous behavior was diverting and amusing. But

  from the moment the man entered politics, they acquired some weight and

  played a role—one that historians have not failed to refl ect on, beginning

  with Thucydides.

  Causing a fuss around oneself could be useful. Prestige leads to power.

  It could even be a benefi t to the city. On Alcibiades, Thucydides devotes a

  brilliant analysis of this possibility that is not to be overlooked.

  Nicias made the Athenians suspicious of A
lcibiades’s excessive ambi-

  tion: the man “may astonish you with his extravagant racehorses and fi nd

  in the exercise of his duty the means of covering his enormous expenses.”

  To which Alcibiades responded by saying:

  The Hellenes, after expecting to see our city ruined by the war, concluded it

  to be even greater than it really is by reason of the magnifi cence with which

  I represented it at the Olympic Games, when I sent into the lists seven char-

  iots, a number never before entered by any private person, and won the fi rst

  prize, and was second and fourth, and took care to have everything else in a

  style worthy of my victory. Custom regards such displays as honorable, and

  they cannot be made without leaving behind them an impression of power.

  Again, any splendor that I may have exhibited at home, in providing cho-

  ruses or otherwise, is naturally envied by my fellow citizens, but in the eyes

  of foreigners has an air of strength as in the other instance. And this is no

  useless folly, when a man, at his own private cost, benefi ts not himself only,

  but his city. (6.16.2–3)

  We do not need to drown this powerful text in commentary. The elabo-

  rate boasts about prestige, extravagant banquets, noisy celebrations that

  Alcibiades makes in this argument are familiar to every age.

  20. Quoted in my earlier discussion, which constitutes an anticipation of Thucydides 6.15.

  30 Chapter

  2

  But wait: there is another side to it. This attitude has a political cost; it

  sows jealousy. And when scandals are added, defi ance and enmity grow.

  Alcibiades’s argument might have been excellent; it might have succeeded;

  but it was weakened, very quickly, by the bitterness and anger it had

  sown. It was not so much his arguments that led to failure as it was the

  memory of his refusal to respect the laws, the liberty he took in speech and

  behavior, that paranomia , as Thucydides called it. 20

  Thucydides explains this in another important passage that gives mean-

  ing to the whole series of misdeeds and misdemeanors that we have just

  examined. It provides a passage of general refl ection. Thucydides recalls

  Alcibiades’s keeping of a stable and other expenses, all of which were be-

  yond his means, and he adds:

  And later on this had not a little to do with the ruin of the Athenian state.

  Alarmed at the greatness of the license in his own life and habits, and at the

  ambition he showed in all things whatsoever that he undertook, the mass

  of the people marked him as aspiring to tyranny and became his enemies;

  and although in public life his conduct of the war was as good as could be

  desired, in his private life his habits gave offense to everyone and caused

  them to commit affairs to other hands, and thus before long to ruin the city.

  (6.15.3–4)

  This passage has been heavily debated, for it seems to telescope two differ-

  ent periods. Thucydides was writing about 416 and the hostilities that led

  to Alcibiades’s fi rst exile; but it slips right into the fi nal disaster, following

  the second exile. 21 This slip, though it need not be taken up here, is nev-ertheless revealing: it shows how, in the life of Alcibiades and in the his-

  tory of the war, things repeat themselves. In fact, Alcibiades’s entire public

  life can be read as a dialogue in which the talents and the defects compete,

  each as vivid as the other.

  There is a lesson here, and it interests us still today because it shows the

  formidable interaction between private scandals and public works—or, as

  we might say, between morality and politics.

  21. One wonders whether the part of the phrase “his conduct of the war was as good

  as could be desired” refers to his brief command of the Sicilian expedition or to later events.

  Here, let us preserve the double possibility.

  First Interlude

  Alcibiades between Two Lifestyles

  These scandals involving Alcibiades have led me, by way of random anec-

  dotes, to a point late in his life. But as Thucydides’s work makes clear, the

  scandals did not become a serious issue until the day they became mixed

  up with politics.

  Could that combination have been avoided? One might have hoped

  that before entering politics Alcibiades would have calmed down, refl ected

  on the real purpose of politics, and understood at a deep level the lessons

  of the man he admired most and whose words he found profoundly mov-

  ing. Was it possible that the failed seduction, in the scene with Socrates,

  might have eventually opened his eyes?

  These are strictly hypothetical questions since we know that Alcibiades

  never allowed himself to pause, that he ran from intrigue to success, from

  success to scandal, from betrayal to rehabilitation, without ever thinking

  about the lessons of his teacher. But Plato, perhaps for the purpose of

  justifying Socrates, 1 demands that we stop this line of thinking and ask 1. See below, chapter 12.

  32 First

  Interlude

  ourselves about that moment when, between the two paths before him—

  that of philosophy and that of immediate success—Alcibiades not only

  failed to choose, but he was not even aware there was a choice.

  There are two dialogues among the works of Plato called Alcibiades .

  We distinguish between them by referring to First Alcibiades and Second

  Alcibiades , the latter a dialogue on prayer. This second is defi nitely not an

  authentic work of Plato. Although the authenticity of the fi rst dialogue

  has also been questioned, it would sadden me to deny Plato’s authorship.

  And it does admirably address the issue of Alcibiades’s failure to make a

  choice between the two paths.

  The problem is similar to the one Prodicus describes when he sets

  Hercules at the crossroads, one path leading to justice and the other to

  pleasure. This quandary is what confronts anyone who is about to take

  action. From the very beginning, Socrates confronts Alcibiades (still a

  young man, 2 and unfamiliar with politics) about the choice before him.

  What Alcibiades wants is immediate success. In a phrase previously noted,

  Socrates describes Alcibiades’s ambition as extending from Athens to all

  of Greece and beyond (105a–c).

  To serve that ambition, Alcibiades needs Socrates. Otherwise, what

  would he know? Where has he learned the meaning of the just? And

  how can he enter politics without knowing what it is? Only knowledge

  of the just is useful. He must aim high. Alcibiades’s true rivals, the only

  rivals worthy of him, are the kings of Sparta and Persia; such a rivalry

  demands application and a serious apprenticeship, in the course of which

  he can acquire self-knowledge. The conclusion: “And if you are to man-

  age the city’s affairs properly and honorably, you must impart virtue

  to the citizens” (134b). Alcibiades then agrees, and makes a resolution:

  “Well, it is decided, I shall begin here and now to focus my attention on

  justice” (135e).

  Socrates expressed his doubts, doubts that would be borne out by

  subsequent events. When this dialogue was written, Plato (or some-

  one else after him, if we do not believe
it to be authentic) knew per-

  fectly well that Alcibiades never applied himself to virtue; that he threw

  2. Not yet twenty years old, according to the text (123d, and also 118e). Another passage is ambiguous about his age but still gives the impression of youth.

  Alcibiades between Two Lifestyles 33

  himself into politics and used every means to advance his personal ob-

  jectives; and that after many highs and lows, he ended up a failure,

  entirely alone.

  First Alcibiades is written, clearly, to show that Socrates’s teaching was

  useless, since Alcibiades never applied it. The dialogue also shows that this

  remarkable young man might have taken a different course had he listened

  more to his teacher, had he paused and refl ected. Just before describing the

  launch of his political career, this momentary pause Plato evokes helps us

  to assess the gravity of the situation. The disasters in Alcibiades’s life and

  the disasters in the history of Athens for which he bears responsibility all

  began with this failure of the student to listen to his teacher, and with the

  grievous separation between morality and politics.

  This same idea reappears in a variety of dialogues, authentic or not.

  The Second Alcibiades presents a young Alcibiades who knows nothing

  of the good, an ignorance that invalidates his piety: he cannot make a sac-

  rifi ce until he dispels his ignorance. And there again, Alcibiades promises

  to apply himself and to learn. He never does so, and was eventually, as we

  know, condemned to death for sacrilege.

  At the end of this book we will refl ect again on the subject of Alcibia-

  des’s character and life as inspiration for Plato. For now, having mentioned

  the opportunity offered to this ambitious young man, the moment when

  something we might call the temptation of the good occurs, it is touching

  to refl ect on one fi nal image. It comes by way of a disciple of Socrates,

  one very close to the teacher, named Aeschines of Sphettos. We cannot be

  certain of its authenticity, but no one can dismiss its symbolic value. As in

  Plato’s Alcibiades , Aeschines of Sphettos shows Socrates shaming Alcibi-

  ades: he compares him to Themistocles and shows how unworthy he is

  by comparison, how ignorant he is. According to the author, Alcibiades