lieve his testimony. He also represented to Endios himself in private that it
would be glorious for him, Endios, to be the means of making Ionia revolt
and the king become the ally of Sparta, instead of that honor being left to
Agis (for Agis, it must be remembered was the enemy of Alcibiades). 3
Such is the characteristic style of that man! He, the exile, now playing the
two supreme authorities in Sparta against each other. He is the one advis-
ing, inspiring everything; and it is also he who will become the hero of the
whole business precisely because of his treachery. Nothing can stop him in
his desire for revenge against the country that could not keep him.
Moreover, what better way to get back at his old adversary King Agis,
who had been the enemy opposing him in the business of the Argive al-
liance and at the battle of Mantinea, and who, just imagine, because of
Alcibiades, was about to become the cuckolded Spartan husband!
This fi ne plan worked. Moreover, in a paradox reminiscent of the vote
on the Sicilian expedition, Alcibiades came out of it even better than he
had planned, and without diffi culty. Originally, he was to have joined
the expedition being organized under the patronage of Agis. Now he is
leaving as the leader, at the head of a small squadron called on to settle
2. 8.17.2.
3. 8.12.1.
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everything, planned solely by the very man in charge. Thucydides con-
cludes: “Endios and his colleagues, thus persuaded, put to sea with the fi ve
ships and the Spartan Chalcideus, and made all haste upon the voyage.” 4
Everything depended on speed, on a lie of omission, and on that art
of persuasion that seemed to be, everywhere and at all times, Alcibiades’s
signature.
He succeeded in doing everything he needed to do, and he was
triumphant.
Arriving at Chios without warning, the two chiefs were received thanks
to their friends and were able to convince the ruling council: the large
island, with its important fl eet, defected from Athens. This defection was
followed by those of two cities situated opposite each other on the conti-
nent, Erythrae and Clazomenae. Neighboring Teos, despite Athens’ efforts
there, then joined the others. More important, Alcibiades obtained—quite
justly—the defection of Miletus. Ephesus apparently then followed the
movement.
To fi nish, an initial agreement was reached between Sparta on the one
hand and “the king and Tissaphernes” on the other.
All of Alcibiades’s promises were fulfi lled and his advice was proven
to be justifi ed.
Still, Athens did not grow discouraged. With a resolve that we have to
admire, it found the means to equip ships again and to try to stymie the
enemy action by intervening everywhere. On the second try, it took the
territory back. Athens incited a democratic revolution in Samos; and, for
the duration of the war, it found on this important island, situated just
south of Chios, a highly valuable base. Athens also took back Clazom-
enae, succeeded in occupying Lesbos, and briefl y threatened Miletus.
Alcibiades had promised so much, and had been so confi dent, that the
news of all these losses inclined Sparta against him. He was, for all practi-
cal purposes, the only leader, because the Lacedaemonian sent with him
had been killed at Miletus. People began to suspect this all-too-brilliant
adventurer (King Agis, no doubt, the fi rst to doubt him). In some ways,
the events at Athens were being repeated: Alcibiades, even when he is on
your side, causes anxiety and bad feelings. As Thucydides says, soberly:
4. 8.12.3.
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“He [was] the personal enemy of Agis and in other respects thought un-
worthy of confi dence.” 5 He was apistos , not credible. How could Alcibiades have been considered otherwise? All the treachery is now exposed.
Added to that, the agreement reached with Tissaphernes (not by him, but
conforming to his strategy) annoyed all those who valued the indepen-
dence of the Ionian Greeks. Not only were these failures exposed and his
personal role in the events disquieting, the very success of his strategy was
cause for anger.
Now what? Let us reread the spy novels of our own time. What hap-
pens to the traitor who has worked for you and whom you come to dis-
trust? The new commander of the Peloponnesian fl eet, in the beginning
of winter, received the order at Chios—quite simply—to kill Alcibiades.
This time there was no legally decided death penalty, as at Athens: this
was an order to kill quickly and discreetly. Precisely as before, Alcibiades
was able to escape just in time. He still had friends in Sparta to warn him:
perhaps it was Endios, even if he was no longer the infl uential friend ex-
pecting Alcibiades to help him gain power. Or perhaps, as some historians
of the time would later romantically surmise, it was Agis’s wife. 6 Whoever it was, Alcibiades escaped to safety for the second time.
Where did he go? Banished from Athens and threatened in Sparta, only
one solution was left to him, obvious and easy: he went to the satrap
Tissaphernes!
Do not let this successful escape surprise you. The satrap welcomed
him, listened, and was seduced. Here Plutarch becomes almost lyrical—
showing us what the charm of Alcibiades could achieve. He writes:
The Persian was a devious and malicious man who felt no qualms about
doing wrong and he was impressed by Alcibiades’s versatility and extraor-
dinary ingenuity. No one, whatever his character or temperament, could fail
to be touched and captivated by Alcibiades’s charisma, if he spent time and
lived with him on a daily basis; even those who feared and envied him found
themselves enjoying his company and warming to him once they were with
him and could actually see him. At any rate, although Tissaphernes felt as
5. 8.45.1.
6. See Justin 5.2, who is quite clear: “He was informed by the wife of King Agis, whom
he had known in adultery.” Cornelius Nepos says that Alcibiades was “so canny that he could not be tricked, especially when the matter affected him” (5).
110 Chapter
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savage a hatred of Greeks as any Persian, he was so won over by Alcibiades’s
blandishments that he outdid him in fl attering him back. He declared that
the most beautiful walled garden he had, which was graced with lawns and
refreshing pools, and dotted with exceptional haunts and places of resort
prepared in a manner fi t for a king, should be named “Alcibiades”—and
that is the name by which everyone continued to refer to it for a long time. 7
The new luxury was a change from weak Spartan broth. But his new
lifestyle also brought with it some diffi cult adjustments. Plutarch, in the
text quoted above, says that Tissaphernes was cruel and hated Greeks.
He was not someone next to whom a Greek could feel comfortable; the
barbarian in him would appear frequently. A short time later, concerning
the people of Delos, Thucydides would report that the Persian Arsaces, a
lieutenant of Tissaphernes, abused some people in Delos, expelled them
from their island, and moved them to Atramytteion: “On pretense of
a secret quarrel, [he] invited the chief men of the Delians to undertake
military service. . . . And after drawing them out from their city as his
friends and allies, had laid in wait for them at dinner, and surrounded
them and caused them to be shot down by his soldiers” (8.108.4). Later
Alcibiades would experience this cruelty and duplicity of the Persian sa-
traps (no longer Tissaphernes). 8 But in the meantime we can well imagine the care he took to stay in favor with his host, and to close his eyes to
certain facts.
He succeeded not only in this but, beyond paying homage, he exercised
real political infl uence on Tissaphernes. Thucydides does not hesitate to
say that he became his tutor ( didaskalos ). And there he is, making deci-
sions, advising, teaching. 9
Moreover, the lesson, whose meaning and importance we will see, is
primarily meant to denigrate Sparta and to turn the satrap against it. Ob-
viously, Sparta had abandoned him, Alcibiades. But the day before, he had
helped it. He came to Asia Minor on its ships, to serve its interests! Never
mind. A second reversal, no less radical than the one that had turned him
against Athens, accompanied his passage to Asia Minor. Once again, he
switched sides.
7. See Life of Alcibiades 24.5–7.
8. See below, chapter 11.
9. Thucydides repeats the word, using the Greek verb didaskein, in 8.45.3.
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One might well ask whether all along he had, in going over to the
side of Tissaphernes, always envisioned that move as preparation for his
eventual return to Athens. He must have always wanted that. His rancor
must have been mixed with a desire to return. Now the possibility of re-
turning would have taken on a more specifi c form. The Spartan leaders
must surely have sensed that his true aim was not to help them (that is
why they judged him to be “not credible”; or at least that was one reason
for their doubts). In any case, he must have come to realize that the desire
to destroy Athens was not as worthy a desire as managing it in order to
return one day as its savior.
This is how Thucydides explains the advice he gave to Tissaphernes
and the king: “Alcibiades gave this advice to Tissaphernes and the King,
with whom he then was, not merely because he thought it really the best,
but because he was seeking means to bring about his restoration to his
country, well knowing that if he did not destroy it he might one day hope
to persuade the Athenians to recall him and thinking that his best chance
of persuading them lay in letting them see that he possessed the favor of
Tissaphernes” (8.47.1).
Here we see Thucydides’s marvelous use of double causality, the second
explanation leading from objective judgment to self-interest. Thucydides
seems to see this dual motivation as a constant feature of Alcibiades’s ac-
tions. It was mentioned at the time of the Argive alliance, where he wrote,
in 5.43.2: “Alcibiades thought the Argive alliance really preferable, not
that personal pique had not also a great deal to do with his opposition.”
That also brought out his jealousy toward Nicias. Similarly, in 6.15.2, we
see two complementary motives: the desire to defeat Nicias and the con-
viction that he really could accomplish his big plan. What good luck, that
each time his sound judgment should match his self-interest! Maybe such
a coincidence should simply be called optimism.
In any case, the advice given to Tissaphernes is emphasized in Greek
by the repetition “at the same time . . . and at the same time . . .” in order
to highlight his desire to return to Athens as savior and man of infl uence.
For this, Alcibiades proceeded in two very distinct stages, like a skillful
manipulator wishing to manage the transition.
First, his advice to Tissaphernes constituted the politics of alternating
between and balancing two opposing sides. Thucydides describes the per-
fectly realistic arguments he developed with the satrap: he should not let
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one of the two adversaries, Athens and Sparta, dominate on the sea and
land; he should let each one exercise supremacy in his own domain. “For
if the command of the sea and land were united in one hand, he would not
know where to turn for help to overthrow the dominant power, unless he
at last chose to stand up for himself and go through with the struggle at
great expense and danger. The cheapest plan was to let the Hellenes wear
each other out, at a small share of the expense and without risk to him-
self.” 10 Further on, Thucydides concludes this calculation with the very plainest bit of advice: “Alcibiades therefore urged him to wear them both
out at fi rst, and after reducing the Athenian power as much as he could,
forthwith to rid the country of the Peloponnesians.” All foreign policies
involving balancing two adversaries can fi nd a model here, exposed with
a realistic clarity that even Machiavelli would have admired. 11
This was very wise advice, and Tissaphernes would adopt it once and
for all.
However, the policy of alternating between Sparta and Athens repre-
sented a clear development in favor of Athens, which, only yesterday, had
been the enemy.
Before stating the principle cited above, Alcibiades had, elsewhere in
Thucydides’s text, made other, more questionable, arguments in favor of
Athens. He had suggested that he could make a deal between Athens,
mistress of the sea, and the king, master on the land. Sparta, by contrast,
had come as a liberator and wished to free the Greeks from the Persians
as well as from the Athenians.
The rationale was subtle. It was so subtle that it confused the histo-
rian’s copyists and later his commentators. But the general meaning is
not in doubt. It rests on an idea Nicias had formulated to reassure Athens
about the possible ambitions of the Syracusans. He had said it was not
reasonable to suppose they would ever attack Athens, fi ghting “empire
against empire.” 12 There would have been solidarity among imperial powers. However, we must say the situation in Asia Minor at the time did not
accord with this theory. It was Sparta that had allied itself with the king; it
10. 8.46.2. The conclusion is in 8.46.4.
11. Plutarch summarizes the analysis elsewhere (25.1).
12. 6.11.3.
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was Sparta who had thought about it at the beginning of the war. And the
satraps in the regions bordering Greece had not complained about Sparta,
but about Athens. Besides, was it not Athens that had always been the
liberating city, freeing Greeks from the barbarians? Alcibiades’s view was
surprising indeed. Maybe it was just another arrow in his quiver, another
example of his usual powers of persuasion.
Tissaphernes, in any case, did not need to be convinced: his actions
proved that.
First, he cut the pay p
romised to the Peloponnesian troops. He had
agreed to give each man one drachma, then announced that he would give
only half that (three obols). According to Plutarch as well as in all prob-
ability, that was Alcibiades’s advice. 13 This move provoked some unrest, particularly with Hermocrates, who, after the victory in Sicily, had come
to rejoin his Peloponnesian allies. Alcibiades had foreseen all this. On
his advice (and here Thucydides is the source), 14 Tissaphernes was careful to pay the offi cers of the Peloponnesian army in exchange for their
cooperation. That’s an example of one way to “persuade” people, and it
is the age-old one. Clearly, Alcibiades knew how to make these measures
acceptable. Moreover, he put himself out in front. When the cities came
to demand their money, it was he who turned them away, replying on Tis-
saphernes’s behalf: he told them that Chios was rich enough to provide its
own security; as for the other cities, they had previously paid a tribute to
Athens. Henceforth they could pay the same amount to ensure their own
security . . . With great aplomb, Alcibiades added that if the king sent
subsides, then everyone would receive the amount they expected in the
fi rst place. Appeals to national pride, hopes, and promises to reward their
patience—he left out nothing. And the result was achieved: the cut in pay
passed without consequences.
Next there was the question of the fl eet. Tissaphernes equipped the
ships in Phoenicia: don’t rush, said Alcibiades. His advice was followed;
and his empty promises meant that the Peloponnesian fl eet lost its ability
to attack.
In short, Alcibiades had succeeded in sowing unrest when a group of
men from Sparta arrived in Ionia; sent as advisers, they were charged
13. 6.25.1.
14. This is where he uses the verb didaskein; see note 9, above.
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with taking measures they deemed desirable. Their leader was one Lichas.
Lichas held a meeting with Tissaphernes, in which he complained about
many things, but in particular about the agreement recently signed be-
tween Sparta and the king. He was outraged, saying that, as things now
stood, he did not want subsidies if that was the price he had to pay. Tis-
saphernes got angry and the advisers left for Rhodes, which rallied to his
side. In other words, as Alcibiades had wished, relations between Sparta
The Life of Alcibiades Page 17
