Note 336 — Chapter LXXII · GREECE UNDER THE LACEDÆMONIAN EMPIRE.

Xen. Hellen. iii, 4, 2.

Lysander accompanied King Agesilaus (when the latter was going to his Asiatic command in 396 B.C.). His purpose was—ὅπως τὰς δεκαρχίας τὰς κατασταθείσας ὑπ᾽ ἐκείνου ἐν ταῖς πόλεσιν, ἐκπεπτωκυίας δὲ διὰ τοὺς ἐφόρους, οἱ τὰς πατρίους πολιτείας παρήγγειλαν, πάλιν καταστήσειε μετ᾽ Ἀγησιλάου.

It shows the careless construction of Xenophon’s Hellenica, or perhaps his reluctance to set forth the discreditable points of the Lacedæmonian rule, that this is the first mention which he makes (and that too, indirectly) of the dekarchies, nine years after they had been first set up by Lysander.