Note 752 — Chapter VII · FIRST AND SECOND MESSENIAN WARS.

Respecting the position of the Eleians and Pisatæ during the second Messenian war, there is confusion in the different statements: as they cannot all be reconciled, we are compelled to make a choice.

That the Eleians were allies of Sparta, and the Pisatans of Messenia, and that the contests of Sparta and Messenia were mixed up with those of Elis and Pisa about the agonothesia of the Olympic games, is conformable to one distinct statement of Strabo (viii. pp. 355, 358), and to the passage in Phavorinus v. Αὐγείας, and is, moreover, indirectly sustained by the view given in Pausanias respecting the relations between Elis and Pisa (vi. 22, 2), whereby it clearly appears that the agonothesia was a matter of standing dispute between the two, until the Pisatans were finally crushed by the Eleians in the time of Pyrrhus, son of Pantaleôn. Farther, this same view is really conformable to another passage in Strabo, which, as now printed, appears to contradict it, but which is recognized by Müller and others as needing correction, though the correction which they propose seems to me not the best. The passage (viii. p. 362) stands thus: Πλεονάκις δ᾽ ἐπολέμησαν (Messenians and Lacedæmonians) διὰ τὰς ἀποστάσεις τῶν Μεσσηνίων. Τὴν μὲν οὖν πρώτην κατάκτησιν αὐτῶν φησὶ Τυρταῖος ἐν τοῖς ποιήμασι κατὰ τοὺς τῶν πατέρων πατέρας γενέσθαι· τὴν δὲ δευτέραν, καθ᾽ ἣν ἑλόμενοι συμμάχους Ἠλείους καὶ Ἀργείους καὶ Πισατὰς ἀπέστησαν, Ἀρκάδων μὲν Ἀριστοκράτην τὸν Ὀρχομένου βασιλάα παρεχομένων στρατηγὸν, Πισατῶν δὲ Πανταλεόντα τὸν Ὀμφαλίωνος· ἡνίκα φησὶν αὐτὸς στρατηγῆσαι τὸν πόλεμον τοῖς Λακεδαιμονίοις, etc. Here it is obvious that, in the enumeration of allies, the Arcadians ought to have been included; accordingly, both O. Müller and Mr. Clinton (ad annum 672 B. C.) agree in altering the passage thus: they insert the words καὶ Ἄρκαδας after the word Ἠλείους, so that both Eleians and Pisatans appear as allies of Messenia at once. I submit that this is improbable in itself, and inconsistent with the passage of Strabo previously noticed: the proper way of altering the passage is, in my judgment, to substitute the word Ἄρκαδας in place of the word Ἠλείους, which makes the two passages of Strabo consistent with each other, and hardly does greater violence to the text.

As opposed to the view here adopted, there is, undoubtedly, the passage of Pausanias (iv. 15, 4) which numbers the Eleians among the allies of Messenia, and takes no notice of the Pisatæ. The affirmation of Julius Africanus (ap. Eusebium Chronic. i. p. 145, that the Pisatæ revolted from Elis in the 30th Olympiad, and celebrated the Olympic games themselves until Ol. 52, for twenty-two successive ceremonies) is in contradiction,—first, with Pausanias (vi. 22, 2), which appears to me a clear and valuable statement, from its particular reference to the three non-Olympiads,—secondly, with Pausanias (v. 9, 4), when the Eleians in the 50th Olympiad determine the number of Hellanodikæ. I agree with Corsini (Fasti Attici, t. iii. p. 47) in setting aside the passage of Julius Africanus: Mr. Clinton (F. H. p. 253) is displeased with Corsini for this suspicion, but he himself virtually does the same thing; for, in order to reconcile Jul. Africanus with Pansanias, he introduces a supposition quite different from what is asserted by either of them; i. e. a joint agonothesia by Eleians and Pisatans together. This hypothesis of Mr. Clinton appears to me gratuitous and inadmissible: Africanus himself meant to state something quite different, and I imagine him to have been misled by an erroneous authority. See Mr. Clinton, F. H. ad. ann. 660 B. C. to 580 B. C.