A tradition has it that he was tortured under the personal direction of Hippias, who wanted the names of fellow-conspirators. Aristogeiton appears to have had a somewhat acid sense of humor, for he only identified men he knew to be among the tyrant’s supporters. He promised to provide further names and asked for Hippias’s handshake as a pledge of safety. When the tyrant took his hand, Aristogeiton jeered at him for taking the hand of his brother’s murderer. Hippias lost his temper and killed the prisoner with his own hand.
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The main consequence of the affair was that the regime became cruel. This was understandable, but ill-advised. After his brother’s death Hippias executed known and potential enemies of the tyranny. He had Leaena tortured to death for the crime of being Aristogeiton’s mistress.
The mood in the city darkened. Hippias could see that he was losing the consent of the people. It was a mistake his father had never made, but he could not help himself. He saw treachery everywhere and he began to lay plans for a bolt-hole in case he were ever driven from Athens. But where could he go and be safe? The empire of Persia, perhaps? Four years after his brother’s death he fortified a hill at Piraeus on the coast called Munychia. If the worst came to the worst he could escape there, catch a waiting ship and sail away.
Meanwhile the inevitable Alcmaeonids, in exile once more, launched attempt after attempt to unseat the tyrant. When one recalls that Pisistratus had confiscated their estates in Attica years previously, their continuing wealth is something of a mystery. But even in the days of Homer, Greek aristocrats cultivated their counterparts in other states and kingdoms. Political instability was endemic and we must assume that many nobles exported their resources; the record of Pisistratus in Thrace and Miltiades in the Chersonese indicates how investment in undeveloped territories could be extremely profitable. And Solon is unlikely to have been the only man of his class to dirty his hands with trade.
The Alcmaeonids built their own fortress at Lipsydrium, a spur of the densely forested mountain range of Parnes to the north of Athens. But Hippias besieged the place and drove the rebels out. They refused to be cowed. In a drinking song about the defeat they were undaunted. Their fallen comrades were, they chanted,
Fine warriors and from good families,
Who proved then what stock they were made of.
The insurrection failed to make progress not because Hippias was a capable military commander, but for a more fundamental reason. The average Athenian saw no advantage in removing the tyranny simply to reinstall a discredited nobility. How could this obstacle be circumvented?
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The Alcmaeonids were not beaten. They had a secret weapon—the oracle at Delphi. The temple of Apollo there had burned down in 548, perhaps the result of the careless barbecuing of sacrificial victims or an explosion of exhalations from the fissure beneath the shrine (see this page). A new temple had to be built at the huge expense of 300 talents. A Panhellenic fundraising campaign produced a quarter of the required sum and Delphi found the rest.
The initial contractors failed to complete the temple. The Alcmaeonids, who seem to have acted as a kind of multinational development corporation, took over the project, and as a gesture of goodwill built, at their own expense, a frontage of top-quality Parian marble. The new temple seems to have been splendid. According to Euripides, its twin pediments were “like eyebrows on a smiling face.” Fine sculptural decorations depicted heroes killing monsters and on one of the pediments the Olympian gods were shown exterminating the race of giants.
The head of the Alcmaeonid clan at this time was Cleisthenes. He is the most remarkable of all the statesmen who populate this history, although his first entry on the scene is not to his credit. Unfortunately, his personality has vanished from the record; we know him only through his actions, but these are enough.
Cleisthenes and his clan realized that to overthrow the tyranny was too large a task for them alone, and that they would need outside help. The only Hellenic state with the prestige and the army to expel Hippias was Sparta. The Alcmaeonids were now, evidently, on very close terms with the Delphic officialdom. The new temple was “more beautiful than the plan” and, in the light of its cost, the oracle was short of money. Cleisthenes is reported to have bribed the oracle to advise the Spartans to depose Hippias. Whenever Sparta consulted the god, the priestess always replied: “First of all free Athens.”
Within its limited geographical bounds, Sparta, disciplined and militant, was a great power, and as is the habit of great powers throughout history it liked to interfere in the policies and programs of other countries. About the middle of the sixth century it consolidated its hold on the Peloponnese. It defeated the polis of Tegea, an important religious center in Arcadia, a region in the highlands of central Peloponnese. Argos, a traditional enemy in the northeast of the peninsula, also came under its influence.
At this time one of its two kings was Cleomenes, an energetic and capable general. He was that rare thing, a Spartan genuinely interested in the outside world; his fellow-countrymen thought him unhinged.
Cleomenes was a man with a distinctive history. His father had married his niece, but she turned out to be infertile. The Spartan ephors, who supervised the activities of the two kings, advised him to marry again, have children by a second wife, and save the bloodline. This he did and the outcome was Cleomenes. Then to everyone’s surprise the first wife gave birth to a son, Dorieus. Who should be the heir—the eldest boy or the son of the first wife? When the old king died, it was decided that Cleomenes should succeed. The hapless Dorieus left Sparta and set up as an adventurer. He planned to found a new city in Sicily, but died in battle.
Cleomenes played a leading role in consolidating Sparta’s dominance of the Peloponnese, and wanted his country to be acknowledged beyond doubt as the leading power in Greece. But he knew his limits: he was tempted to come to the assistance of the Ionians when they rose against the Persian king. However, on learning that it took three months to journey inland from the sea to the Great King’s capital, he decided not to help, even though the incautious Athenians sent twenty warships to support the rebels.
Eventually the Spartans agreed to invade Attica and depose Hippias. It is hard to see why; the tyrants had always taken care to be on good terms with Sparta, although they also cultivated friendly relations with its rival Argos. The pressure from Delphi must have played a part, and so may the influence of the expansionist Cleomenes. Most significantly, Sparta liked doing business with aristocratic oligarchies.
Sparta’s first expedition against Athens failed; the foot soldiers were overwhelmed by cavalry from Thessaly, horse-rearing country in northern Greece whose independent-minded tribesmen came to Hippias’s aid. In 510 King Cleomenes was sent with a larger expedition to retrieve the situation. This time the Thessalians were beaten and went home. Hippias took refuge in the Acropolis. His prospects for holding out were quite good, for he had ample supplies of food and drink and the Spartans were not prepared or equipped for a long blockade.
At this point luck intervened. Hippias sent away his five children to a place of safety abroad, but they were captured by the enemy. This broke his spirit. On condition that they were returned to him, he agreed to gather all his possessions and leave Attica within five days. The Athenian ecclesia passed a law removing citizenship in perpetuity from the entire clan of Pisistratids—a sentence that was never to be rescinded. A pillar was set up on the Acropolis listing their crimes and setting down all the family’s names.