Note 149 — Chapter XX · STATE OF SOCIETY AND MANNERS AS EXHIBITED IN GRECIAN LEGEND.

Even in the century prior to Thucydidês, undistinguishing plunder at sea, committed by Greek ships against ships not Greek, seems not to have been held discreditable. The Phokæan Dionysius, after the ill-success of the Ionic revolt, goes with his three ships of war to Sicily, and from thence plunders Tyrrhenians and Carthaginians (Herod. vi. 17).—ληϊστὴς κατεστήκεε, Ἑλλήνων μὲν οὐδενὸς, Καρχηδονίων δὲ καὶ Τυρσηνῶν. Compare the conduct of the Phokæan settlers at Alalia in Corsica, after the conquest of Ionia by Harpagus (Herodot. i. 166).

In the treaty between the Romans and Carthaginians, made at some period subsequent to 509 B. C., it is stipulated,—Τοῦ Καλοῦ Ἀκρωτηρίου, Μαστίας, Ταρσηΐου, μὴ ληΐζεσθαι ἐπέκεινα Ῥωμαίους μηδ᾽ ἐμπορεύεσθαι, μηδὲ πόλιν κτίζειν (Polyb. iii. 24, 4). Plunder, commerce, and colonization, are here assumed as the three objects which the Roman ships would pursue, unless they were under special obligation to abstain, in reference to foreigners. This morality approaches nearer to that of the Homeric age, than to the state of sentiment which Thucydides indicates as current in his day among the Greeks.