. for all that he was such toward me, never would I requite him with indignity, or refuse to avow that, in all our Greek host which came to Troy, I have seen none who was his peer, save Achilles. It were not just, then, that he should suffer dishonour at thy hand; 'tis not he, 'tis the law of Heaven that thou wouldst hurt. When a brave man is dead, 'tis not right to do him scathe— no, not even if thou hate him."I In reference to the Sophoclean treatment of this subject, particularly with regard to the conflict between Creon and Antigone, the writer quoted above observes: "In giving that issue to his play, Sophocles was doing what the general feeling of his own age would strongly demand. Greeks of the fifth century B.C. observed the duty towards the dead, even when warfare was bitterest, and when the foe was barbarian. The Athenians buried the Persians slain at Marathon, as the Persians buried the Lacedaemonians slain at Thermopylae. A notable exception may, indeed, be cited ; but it is one of those exceptions which forcibly illustrate the rule. The Spartan Lysander omitted to bury the Athenians who fell at Aegospotami; and that omission was remembered, centuries later, as an indelible stigma upon his name." 1 Soph. Ajax, 1332 seq.: ΟΔ. ἄκουέ νυν. τὸν ἄνδρα τόνδε πρὸς θεῶν 2 Introduction to the Antigone, sect. xxii. 3 Cf. Pausan. ix. 32. 6 : Φιλοκλέα γὰρ 'Αθηναῖον ἐν Αἰγὸς ποταμοῖς καὶ αὐτὸν στρατηγοῦντα καὶ Ἀθηναίων τῶν ἄλλων ὅσον After the defeat of the Persians by Pausanias, Lampon, one of the most eminent of the Aeginetae, advised him (as has already been referred to) to impale Mardonius, as a retaliation for the like treatment of Leonidas, the Spartan general's uncle, who had fallen at Thermopylae. But Pausanias indignantly repudiated the suggestion, and remarked that to offer indignities to the dead was condemned by the laws of civilized warfare.1 performing Truces for performing the last duties to the dead, Truces for σπονδαὶ εἰς νεκρῶν ἀναίρεσιν, were usually concluded at obsequies. the close of a conflict. A non-Hellenic example of this practice may be mentioned in reference to the battle of Rhaphia, 217 B.C., where Antiochus was defeated by Ptolemy. The vanquished party having reached Gaza despatched an embassy to the victor to get leave to pick up their dead, and accordingly obtained a truce for performing the customary funeral rites.2 In case of refusal, exceptionally strong reasons were necessary; as, for example, in the second sacred war, where the Phocidians had maliciously violated the law of nations by pillaging the Delphian temple and insulting its god. In the battle of Delium, 424 B.C., the Boeotians refused the Athenians permission to bury their dead, on the ground that they had been guilty of sacrilege, and transgression against universally recognized Hellenic law,—ὅτι οὐ δικαίως δράσειαν παραβαίνοντες τὰ νόμιμα τῶν ̔Ελλήνων ;4 but after the capture of Delium, they delivered the dead at the renewed request of the Athenian herald. And, conformably to such mitiga τετρακισχιλίους αἰχμαλώτους ὄντας ἀπέκτεινεν ὁ Λύσανδρος, καί σφισιν οὐδὲ ἀποθανοῦσιν ἐπήνεγκε γῆν, ὃ καὶ Μήδων τοῖς ἀποβᾶσιν ἐς Μαραθῶνα ὑπῆρξε παρ' Αθηναίων, καὶ αὐτῶν Λακεδαιμονίων τοῖς πεσοῦσιν ἐν Θερμοπύλαις ἐκ βασιλέως Ξέρξου. 1 Herodot. ix. 79. 2 Polyb. v. 86: ...κἀκεῖ καταστρατοπεδεύσας και διαπεμψά. μενος περὶ τῆς τῶν νεκρῶν ἀναιρέσεως, ἐκήδευσε τοὺς τεθνεῶτας ὑποσπόνδους. 8 Diodor. xvi. 25. 4Thuc. iv. 97. 5Thuc. iv. I01. In Rome. The conclusion of truces. tions, Plato lays down that the dead must not be despoiled, or their burial hindered.1 The Romans, too, observed these principles. Even as far back as the epoch of Latinus, the king of the Laurentians, we find, according to Virgil's narrative, the king's ambassadors going to Aeneas to ask for a two days' truce for burying their dead; on which occasion the envoys pointed out that the death of the combatants at once obliterated their enemy character: "nullum cum victis certamen et aethere cassis." 2 The embassy of Latinus was welcomed, and the request readily granted: nunc ite et miseris supponite civibus ignem.' 3 In 189 B.C. after a conflict between the Macedonians under Philip and the Athamanians and Aetolians, permission to bury the dead was given under a truce,postea per indutias sepeliendi caesos potestas facta est."4 5 Truces (Tovdai; èxexeipia, literally a holding of hands,' hence, a cessation of hostilities) were concluded also for other reasons than for performing the solemnities of sepulture. They were established for the exchange, ransom, or release of prisoners of war,—ὑποσπόνδους ἀπίεναι τοὺς αἰχμαλώτας. They were sometimes granted when a besieged city offered to surrender on certain conditions. Thus, on the capitulation of Potidaea, 430 B.C., the citizens, as well as the foreign troops, were to come out of the city, the men with one garment, the women with two, and they were allowed a certain sum of money for their journey. 1 Repub. v. 469 D: Ἐατέον ἄρα τὰς νεκροσυλίας καὶ τὰς τῶν ἀναιρέσεων διακωλύσεις; Ἐατέον μέντοι, ἔφη, νὴ Δία. 2 Aen. xi. 104. 3 Aen. xi. 119. 4 Liv. xxxviii. 2. 5 As to the difference between εἰρήνη, σπονδαί, and ἐκεχειρία, and the exact significance of the latter, see vol. i. p. 376. • Plut. Sol. 9. Accordingly they departed under a safe-conduct, vπóσTоvdo éλoov, and sought fresh homes.1 In 425 B.C., on the proclamation of Cleon and Demosthenes, the Lacedaemonians agreed to surrender at discretion to the Athenians; whereupon a truce was made, and the two Athenian commanders then held a parley-εuvîλ0ov és Móyous-with Styphon, the Lacedaemonian leader. Afterwards, the Spartans sent a herald and removed their own dead.2 negotiations. An armistice frequently served as a preliminary to Armistice and formal peace negotiations; and here we find three kinds peace of functionaries employed, namely, heralds, ambassadors, and their suites furnished with safe-conducts, kýpukɩ dè καὶ πρεσβείᾳ καὶ ἀκολούθοις . . . σπονδὰς εἶναι. . . . Thus in 423 B.C. Athens and Sparta, including their respective allies, made a truce for a year with a view to subsequently establishing peace on a secure basis by means of diplomatic methods, and to effect a balance between the contending powers. During the continuance of the armistice (exexeipía), says Thucydides, fresh negotiations for a final peace were constantly carried on. Similarly, a thirty days' truce was offered to Philip by the Aetolians through the Rhodian and Chian ambassadors;" and Antiochus, after his unsuccessful siege of Dura in Phoenicia, agreed with Ptolemy's ambassadors to a suspension of hostilities for a period of four months." As an example of a formal engagement of this nature, it will be of interest to observe the provisions laid down in the truce between Athens and Lacedaemon of Truce between the year 423 B.C., which secured for all the parties Sparta. concerned liberty of access to the oracle at Delphi, and the protection of its treasures, insisted on the principle 1Thuc. ii. 70. Thuc. iv. 38 : ... οἱ δὲ Λακεδαιμόνιοι κήρυκα πέμψαντες τοὺς νεκροὺς διεκομίσαντο. 3Thuc, iv. 118, 4 Thuc. iv. 119 : Ἡ μὲν δὴ ἐκεχειρία αὕτη ἐγένετο, καὶ ξυνῄεσαν ἐν αὐτῇ περὶ τῶν μειζόνων σπονδῶν διὰ παντὸς ἐς λόγους. Athens and Access to the temple in safety. Protection of its treasures. The principle of 'uti possidetis.' of uti possidetis,' prohibited Peloponnesian vessels of war from sailing in their territorial waters, and provided for arbitration, for diplomatic negotiations by the accredited plenipotentiaries of the contracting States, and for the extradition of deserters. It appears that the conditions had been first agreed upon at Sparta, and then submitted to Athens for acceptance; that resolutions of the Athenian assembly were returned to Sparta, and there approved; and that finally followed the formal ratification by certain appointed individuals on behalf of the respective parties to the truce. The following were the conditions as reported by Thucydides: (1) 'Concerning the temple and oracle of the Pythian Apollo, it seems good to us that any one who will shall ask counsel thereat without fraud and without fear, according to his ancestral customs. To this we, the Lacedaemonians and their allies here present, agree, and we will send heralds to the Boeotians and Phocians, and do our best to gain their assent likewise. (2) Concerning the treasures of the god, we will take measures for the detection of evil-doers, both you and we, according to our ancestral customs, and any one else who will, according to his ancestral customs, proceeding always with right and equity. Thus it seems good to the Lacedaemonians and their allies in respect of these matters. (3) It further seems good to the Lacedaemonians and their allies that, if the Athenians consent to a truce, each party shall remain within his own territory, retaining what he has. The Athenians at Coryphasium shall keep within the hills of Buphras and Tomeus. They shall remain at Cythera, but shall not communicate with the Lacedaemonian confederacy, neither we with them nor they with |