Shit Oracles Say

This is my favourite SMBC comic. I'm sure you've seen it before, but just in case you haven't here is is again:

If you've never seen any of the SMBC comics before, you can read all of them here. But, err, read the rest of my blog first, yeah? You'll be there a while.

Anyway, I thought there were a couple of other amusing oracle stories that were worth sharing.

Sparta and the Tegeans

Once upon a time, the Spartans weren't the supreme military force we saw in 300. Way back in the 6th century BC, they were trying to conquer Tegea in Arcadia. Despite it's idyllic name, Arcadia was actually a pretty rough place, with few natural resources to speak of. First, they went and asked the Oracle what she thought about their plans. She told them:

"Cravest thou Arcady? Bold is thy craving. I shall not content it.
Many the men that in Arcady dwell, whose food is the acorn-
They will never allow thee. It is not I that am niggard.
I will give thee to dance in Tegea, with noisy foot-fall,
And with the measuring line mete out the glorious campaign."

They figured this was a pretty promising poem. It doesn't say they can have all of Arcadia, but it does let them take Tegea. And doesn't it say they'll dance- presumably with victory? And doesn't she also tell them they should even take surveying equipment (the measuring line) so they can measure up their conquered territory?

So, feeling confident, the Spartans set off, carrying with them fetters to bind the enslaved Tegeans. Unfortunately, they were roundly defeated, and many of them captured. Using the lines and chains the Spartans themselves had brought along, they were made slaves and forced to work the Arcadian soil. This became known as the Battle of the Fetters.

They went back to the Oracle and asked: what gives? Which god did they have to appease to be able to defeat the Tegeans? She answered them:

"Level and smooth is the plain where Arcadian Tegea standeth;
There two winds are ever, by strong necessity, blowing,
Counter-stroke answers stroke, and evil lies upon evil.
There all-teeming Earth doth harbour the son of Atrides;
Bring thou him to thy city, and then be Tegea's master."

The son of Atrides was Orestes, the son of Agamemnon. As you might imagine, it took them quite a long time to find the bones of a mythical hero. After all, doesn't one skeleton look much like another?

Fortunately, they happened to find them in Tegea itself (which gives them a mythical claim to the land, as Orestes was Spartan on his mother's side. That's probably the whole reason for this story.) Convenient that. A Spartan called Lichas heard a Tegean smith talking about digging a well in the middle of his forge. Apparently he found a coffin seven cubits long (that's about 3.2m), and, since he didn't believe the stories that said heroes were much taller than other men, he opened it up. There was a body the same size. He reburied it and figured that was the end of that. Lichas persuaded him to rent the room out, took it and secretly recovered the bones and returned them to Sparta.

"From henceforth, whenever the Spartans and the Tegeans made trial of each other's skill in arms, the Spartans always had greatly the advantage; and by the time to which we are now come they were masters of most of the Peloponnese.  "- Herodotus Histories book 1.

We don't know what happened to the bones after that, but they were probably interred in a temple and made into a hero cult.

But wait: people weren't ever three metres tall! What was it that Lichas found? Paul Cartledge reckons it was a fossilised dinosaur. Just when you thought they couldn't get any cooler, turns out the Spartans were worshipping dinosaurs.

Recall your Exiles!

Theagenes of Thasos was exactly the kind of jammy bastard we all secretly hate. He was a skilled athlete, excelling at every kind of physical contest. In total, he was supposed to have 1300 victor's crowns (equivalent to gold medals in major sporting events now). When he died, the people of Thasos put up a statue of him.

But there was one (unnamed) man who let his anger out: he hated Theagenes alive, and he hated him dead. In the middle of the night he would go out and mercilessly scourge (whip) the statue. One night, the statue put and end to this by falling on him and killing him. That should have been the end of it, but the dead man's sons prosecuted the statue for murder. They were successful (statues find it quite hard to speak up for themselves), the statue was condemned to exile and thrown into the harbour.

Soon afterwards there was a famine in Thasos, and so they went to the oracle to ask her what they should do. She gave them a standard reply: to recall their exiled citizens. Duly, they did so, but still the famine did not abate (I think you can see where this is going), so they went back. You know what she said?

"But you have forgotten your great Theagenes."

So, with a great deal of difficulty they managed to recover the statue, put it in its original position, and, for good measure, began worshipping it like a god.


Burns Throughout History #3

Since we've been discussing Sparta, here's a tiny quote from King Agesilaus when he was being shown around a city (probably Athens, but I don't have the name to hand). His guides drew his attention to the solid city-walls with their exceptionally strong construction, and he replied:

"What splendid woman's quarters!"


...burn. 

The Madness of King Cleomenes

After a (short) absence for exams, I am back, and with an old favourite of mine: King Cleomenes I of Sparta. You might not remember him from such films as 300, when he was the king who threw the envoys into the well, with the immortal line:  "You'll find plenty [of earth and water] down there". Sorry Leonidas.


Parentage


First things first: the Spartans had two kings at any one time, descended from different lineages. For more information on that, see this blog. Cleomenes was from the Agiad line, and was the eldest son of Anaxandrides II.  But Anaxandrides had a bit of a problem.

You see, his wife (whose name is not recorded) seemed to be unable to conceive. They were (apparently) happy, but alas, there were no children. The Ephors (who weren't creepy inbred priests, but rather an elected council of officials) were worried about this: there were no heirs to the throne, and at this rate it didn't look like there would be. So what would they do? The only sensible thing, of course. They told Anaxandrides to take another wife. Well, he refused to divorce her (he loved her too much for that), so he just took a second wife. Seems to have worked out rather well for him there.

This new wife quickly got on with bearing a son: Cleomenes. Unfortunately (but somehow typically), the first wife miraculously became pregnant, and had Dorieus, Leonidas, Cleombrotus in quick succession. Spartan law was a bit shaky on these things, and so both Cleomenes and Dorieus had strong claims to the throne.
Despite the Ephors' preparations, succession was going to be a difficult time. In the event, three of the sons held power at one time or another.


Succession

While they were young, Cleomenes seemed to verge on madness, and Dorieus was the darling of everyone. Dorieus was sure he would be made king, as he was so clearly suited for the job. Unfortunately, that's never really counted for much when appointing new kings, and he was passed over in favour of Cleomenes. Deciding he couldn't bear it, Dorieus asked to be given a group of men and set out to found a colony, though quite how he intended to do that with only men in his group he never explained. In the event, he flounced off in a fit of pique and bummed around the Mediterranean for a bit without any real goal in mind (no change there for sons of the aristocracy). Later he upset the Oracle, and probably died in a foreign war. Cleomenes seemed secure.


Wars at Athens

 Cleomenes was later involved in several excursions outside the Peloponnese, most notably to Athens. This may partly explain why he was considered so reckless by the other Spartans: Spartan forces rarely left the Peloponnese in case of a Helot revolt in their absence. Sparta held hegemony over most of the Peloponnese at this point, and it could be easily defended at the Isthmus of Corinth. See the map below.

Cleomenes first went to Athens after receiving an oracle that instructed him to remove the tyrant Hippias from the city. He duly did so. Two Athenian statesmen then fought each other for the right to rule Athens, and Cleomenes attempted to interfere on the part of one of them, but his Corinthian allies mutinied. This second expedition was abandoned, and everyone went home.

However, some time soon after Cleomenes decided he should restore Hippias to Athens. This is a U turn of which even the grubbiest politician could be proud, but it did have some basis: it turned out that the Athenians had bribed the oracle to instruct Cleomenes in the first place. Wheels within wheels. 

However, once again the allies mutinied, this time in the first act of the Peloponnesian League (who become important later in the Peloponnesian War), and the plan was abandoned.


The Ionian Revolt, or What Cleomenes Did Next

 Cleomenes was later asked for help by Aristagoras. He was from Miletus which was on other side of the Aegean (see map), and wanted help for his revolt against the Persians. This revolt is credited by Herodotus as being the start of the Graeco-Persian Wars. His suit was unsuccessful. The king could not take Spartan troops on a three month journey from the city; the danger of revolt was too great. Aristagoras pursued him for several days, offering larger and larger bribes until Cleomenes young daughter Gorgo (yes, that makes Leonidas her half-uncle, yes, she's the attractive lady from 300) overheard them. With all the self assurance of an eight or nine year old, she said: "Father get up and go, or the stranger will certainly corrupt you". Cleomenes was supposedly swayed by this, and went out of the room.

The Athenians would later offer aid to Aristagoras, and (again, according to Herodotus) "These ships were the beginnings of [all] the evils". Supposedly, the Persians would have left main Greece alone, but for this aid.


Dethroning Demaratus

 Demaratus was Cleomenes' co-king for much of his reign. He took the Corinthians' side in many of the mutinies, and was generally unhelpful. After the failure of the Ionian Revolt, many of the smaller cities surrendered to Persian, including Aegina. Cleomenes decided to make an example of them, and demanded the handing over of the collaborators. They refused, Demaratus swanned around undermining his authority, and really, there was only one option open to him now.

So, Cleomenes sent a bribe to the Oracle (after all, it had worked out really well for the Athenians), and had her find for Leotcyhides, a relative of Demaratus. The reason? Demaratus' parentage was in dispute. Seems a bit rich, coming from Cleomenes.

However, the Spartans, pious as ever,  duly got rid of Demaratus and appointed Leotychides. Demaratus was forced to flee to Persia, where he advised King Xerxes about Spartan tactic (you may remember him from The 300 Spartans). Leotychides was later condemned for taking Persian bribes. It's hard to know who got the raw end of the deal here.


Madness and Death

As with all good stories, Cleomenes' plot against Demaratus was discovered, and he was forced to leave Sparta in exile. He travelled for a time, notably learning to drink his wine neat (as the Scythians and other barbarians did), rather than dilute (which all abstemious Greeks did). The Spartans later claimed this was a contributing factor to his madness. Cleomenes then tried to gather armies for a revolt against Sparta from her allies.

The Spartans brought him back to their city, where he was afflicted with a strange madness: which apparently compelled him to strike every Spartan he met upon the face with his sceptre. His surviving half-brothers claimed he was completely insane and placed him in prison. He was supposedly left alone in stocks, with a single Helot guard. He frightened this man into handing over a knife and proceeded to mutilate himself to death. This was the story put about by Leoniadas, who now assumed the throne.

It is not improbable that reports of his madness had been exaggerated, and that Leonidas had him quietly removed- probably by a member of the Krypteia.




Footnotes, Endnotes and Appendices: Cleomenes was king for about 30 years (c. 520- 489). While most of what we hear about him is amusingly bad press, he was probably a very competant general and a seemingly brilliant tactition. Few other Spartan generals have such a record of success (sorry Leonidas).
Oh, and Cleombrotus gained power after Leonidas' death, when he acted as Regent for Leonidas' young son by Gorgo.

Five Things About Sparta You Can't Learn From 300

1. Two Kings. At the same time.

In 300, there's just Leonidas, but most of the time the Spartans actually had two kings in office. There were two separate royal lineages, the Agids, who were marginally more important, and the Eurypontids, and are supposedly derived from the legendary twins Eurysthenes and Procles.

This actually caused fewer problems than you might think, because the Spartan kings were not autonomous. There were several other groups who had control of things like law and government policy. The kings were more like permanent generals. Once, two kings (Cleomenes I and Dematatus) went on campaign together, had a girly spat about Athenian democracy, culminating in Dematatus going home early and taking the ball- or in this case, their helpful allies the Corinthians. Naturally, they couldn't be friends after this, and Cleomenes eventually schemed to have Demaratus overthrown. Demaratus then fled to Persia, where he advised Xerxes about the Spartans at Thermopylae. This incident culminated in legislation preventing them both from going on campaign at once.

Other powers of the kings were mostly army-based. They were head of their barracks, and allowed two of the allotted rations of food, though the implication was that this was to award to someone else, rather than something they got to keep for themselves. It's also not as cushy as it sounds: one visitor, after tasting their famous 'blood soup' remarked that he "now knew why the Spartans were so keen to die". They were also, crucially, allowed a personal body guard of up to 300 men. Which brings us to...


2. Extremely Pious

As Herodotus puts it, the commands of the gods were more important to the Spartans than the commands of mortals. While in 300 the Ephors are crazy, inbred, historically inaccurate monsters, that they forbid the war is actually correct. The Spartans in general were incredibly pious, always making certain to run their decisions by the Oracle at Delphi, and making sure to check the animal guts before they did anything.

One guy, Tisamenos, an Elean, went to the Oracle to ask 'how to get children'. I'm not sure exactly what he meant by that, but I like to think they were having fertility trouble, rather than that he just didn't know what to do. Instead of offering any helpful advice, she told him he would win five great contests. He assumed that he would win the pentathlon, and promptly entered. He only won four of the five events, so clearly this couldn't have been what the Oracle was talking about, which meant he was clearly going to win five battles. The Spartan nobility decided to try and engage him as their divine auger, to check the omens were right before they went into battle. They were so desperate to have him onside that he was able to secure full Spartan citizenship for himself and his brother, the only two foreigners known to have achieved this.

At the time when Leonidas wanted to leave Sparta for Thermopylae, it was the Carneia, one of the most important festivals of the calendar, and so (supposedly) the army wasn't allowed to march to war. Hence, Leonidas and his 300 bodyguards decided to "take a walk".

Just this once, that excuse might have worked, except that this was their excuse for not being at Marathon too. It's generally thought a lot more likely these days that they didn't like to leave the city for too long in case of a slave revolt.


3. Slave Population

They didn't show up at all in 300, but all Spartan warriors had an allotted number of Helots, who were a kind of mixture of serf and slave. Serfs in that they were allowed to keep some of their produce, and slaves in that they were owned and could be disposed of by their masters. Though almost all Greek cities kept actual slave populations, they had only enslaved foreigners, who were obviously naturally inferior, whereas Sparta enslaved fellow Greeks which was clearly not on. These slaves were the people of nearby villages and a neighbouring town, of Messenia.

Myron of Priene said that: "They assign to the Helots every shameful task leading to disgrace. For they ordained that each one of them must wear a dogskin cap and wrap himself in skins and receive a stipulated number of beatings every year regardless of any wrongdoing, so that they would never forget they were slaves. Moreover, if any exceeded the vigour proper to a slave's condition, they made death the penalty; and they allotted a punishment to those controlling them if they failed." and Plutarch adds that they were forced to drink neat wine until drunk, and then "lead them in that condition into their public halls, that the children might see what a sight a drunken man is; they made them to dance low dances, and sing ridiculous songs."

The numbers of these slaves and the number of  Spartan warriors varied over time, but at the most extreme there were probably 10,000 Spartans and 250,000 Helots. Obviously, being this outnumbered, they had to take some quite bizarre measures in order to control them.

Myrion of Priene again: "The helots were invited by a proclamation to pick out those of their number who claimed to have most distinguished themselves against the enemy, in order that they might receive their freedom; the object being to test them, as it was thought that the first to claim their freedom would be the most high spirited and the most apt to rebel. As many as two thousand were selected accordingly, who crowned themselves and went round the temples, rejoicing in their new freedom. The Spartans, however, soon afterwards did away with them, and no one ever knew how each of them perished."

As you can imagine, the Spartans weren't too keen to take their army away from the city, when there could be a revolt in their absence. There were several very serious ones during Sparta's hey-day, including one that lasted ten years.

It is another attempt to control the Helots that forms out next section.


4. Roving Death Squads of Teenagers

You've probably heard all about the Spartan school system. If not, here's a handy explanatory video. Reports vary, but either in your last year in the system, known as the Agoge, or just afterwards, and in both cases were really good at being a Spartan, you were drafted into the Krypteia. This was essentially the Spartan secret police, who existed mostly to prevent Helot revot by killing them whenever and wherever they saw fit. They were presumably selected by the Boy Herd, who oversaw the whole Agoge. Being selected was a great honour, and usually earmarked you for one of the higher offices of state. Like many other Spartan practices, the Krypteia was all about becoming a better soldier, and, unexpectedly, this last point was designed to do just that.


5. Dance Champions of the Greek World

The Spartans were all about being the best at things. If that included singing and dancing in unison, well, fine then. According to Cartledge, ''The Spartans were famed for dancing in general, and  for one particular military dance, the Pyrrhic''.

The reason the Spartans were so good at fighting was (as we learned from 300) that they were really, really disciplined at phalanx fighting. Co-ordination in phalanx formation is incredibly important, so all the dancing and singing in groups had two purposes: one, to help everyone keep in step when it really mattered (i.e. when fighting the Persians or the Athenians), and two, to keep the gods onside, because dancing and singing were also forms of cultic worship, and as we saw earlier, the Spartans were pretty damn pious.

You heard it here first guys. Unless you've read your Cartledge.

Top Four (Recent) Films Set In The Ancient World

This week, I'm pretty busy with revision and other things for the start of term. However, I am pleased to present you with some films set in the ancient world that you might enjoy.

Troy

Plot, as I'm sure you're all aware, is that the Greeks vs Trojans in a fight to the death over Orlando Bloom stealing someone's wife.

It is nicely put together, I'll give it that. The armour and so on, I am reliably informed, is not particularly accurate, but then, it is based c. 1100 BCE, and our information about quite what they were wearing at that time is a bit patchy. No contemporary issues of Vogue remain. But it all looks pretty; the beaches look sandy and Troy looks suitably like a city surrounded by implausible walls. Some solid performances, though no one was required to do anything more difficult than scowl or pout, of which the favourite has to be Brian Cox as Agamemnon. He seems to get everywhere these days.

Historical accuracy? Well, Troy is based on Homer's epic poem, The Illiad, rather than on a sound historical account, and the accuracy of the events that it depicts has been debated for (literally) millennia. So... as mentioned above, costuming is probably not accurate to time period. The plot, however, doesn't really manage to stick with the plot of The Illiad. For a start, where have all the Gods gone? What about the duration of the war? Where are Priam's other sons? I'm sure any classics geeks out there would be glad to add to this list for me.

6/10

The Eagle

Fewer people have heard of this one, perhaps for good reason. Plot: The Ninth Legion mysteriously disappeared north of Hadrian's Wall, losing their Eagle standard. Now, a (slightly) crippled army officer and his British slave must get it back.

This is really quite enjoyable, as one-man-and-his-dog (or in this case, slave) films often are. The dialogue is stilted at times, particularly in the "serious" scenes, where the Roman is forced to confront Rome's brutality (Sample dialogue: "Rome is wonderful" "Rome killed my father, my mother, and all of my brothers. It was going to put me to death in an arena" "....Oh"), and the depiction of the tribes north of the wall is laughably bad. Why aren't they wearing any clothes? This is Scotland; it gets cold in Scotland. They almost seem to have wandered off the latest Cowboys-and-Indians set, where they'd still be inaccurate, but less out of place.

Any other historical inaccuracies? The whole plot, for a start, is ridiculous. The IX legio Hispania is last attested in Dacia (Eastern Europe) rather than Britain, and was probably disbanded due to ill-luck, than completely destroyed. However, since that is the plot of the book (Rosemary Sutcliffe's The Eagle of the Ninth) on which this film is based, I'm prepared to overlook it. My favourite inaccuracy is that of the crossbow brooches (see figure below). In the film, these are worn on the chest like modern brooches, with short bar pointing up, like a crucifix. The Romans themselves would have worn them the other way up (like the inverted or 'satanic' crucifix), and protruding from the top of the shoulder, like a clothes peg. It's my favourite because it means whoever designed the costumes really bothered to do their research, and then someone later mis-heard them, and now they have upside down Roman brooches in their film.

7/10
 
300

This is practically a genre classic by now, isn't it? Even if that genre is just slow-mo and cartoony blood. You can tell because Spartacus: Blood and Sand tried, and failed to replicate it.

Plot: This is SPARTA! and they send out 300 troops to hold back a Persian army of c.1,000,000. Yeah, okay guys.

Like the others, it's well put together, but unlike the others, the poor dialogue doesn't grate because it somehow fits with the ridiculous machismo of the rest of the film. It's slick, silly and with a whole lot of violence. What's not to love?

Historical inaccuracies? It'd be easier to list things that were accurate. Firstly: why aren't they wearing any clothes? Well, traditionally the Spartans went to war naked, but they'd started wearing armour by the time they fought with the Persians, so... artistic license? Really, just 300 guys? Yup. 300 Spartans, that is. About 20,000 people from other cities, but the Spartans were having a festival, and it's quite hard to spare more dancers when you need to put on a show. Fun fact: the Spartans were actually the dance champions of the Greek world. Those ridiculous one liners? From Herodotus and Diodorus we get "Tonight we dine in hell", "Then we shall fight in the shade" and "You'll find plenty of earth and water down there [the well]". Sadly, they left out the bit where the Athenians threw their own Persian envoys into The Pit.

 Score 10/10

Life of Brian

Classic, guys, classic. Plot: Monty Python comedy film about Judean Messianic figures around the time of Jesus. How could it fail?

I, and most of my friends, have seen this film so many times we could probably re-enact it ourselves with just fake beards and a gourd. And it's still funny. And, as I learn more about the history of Judea, it actually gets funnier. There's no need to go on about how great this film is: if you've seen it, you know what I'm talking about, and if you haven't do so. Immediately.

Inaccuracies? Actually, it does quite well. There were dozens, if not hundreds, of ineffective splinter resistance groups, all believing slightly different things about god. There were also dozens of chanting prophets, and dozens of people hailed as the Messiah. Jesus was either the real one, or incredibly persuasive, depending on your point of view. As a Roman citizen, you had the right to be tried by the governor, or the Emperor (a right enjoyed by both Brian and St Peter), and as I'm sure we're all aware, crucifixtion was relatively common for executions.

10/10



Hang on: what happened to Gladiator?

Sorry, but I just don't like Gladiator. I know it won all those Oscars, but I really don't think it's that good. The opening battle scenes are fantastic, as is the closing twenty minutes, but as far as I can tell nothing happens in between. Russel Crowe just felt wooden to me, and I couldn't really understand his motivavtion for any of it. Joaquin Phoenix was excellent, but made everyone else look worse by comparison. And the 'historical consultant' was forced to write letters of apology en masse to other ancient historians.







Note: I have excluded the Golden Age '50s classics (e.g. Ben Hur), because otherwise the whole list would just be those films. I have also excluded Agora, a recent film, because I haven't seen it yet, though people say it's pretty good.