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Having covered some youth and youthful enmities, we move on to the early political career of Themistocles. Specifically, the whole thing with the silver mines, which you may recall from way back when we first saw him in Herodotus.
Not a lot to say, really; the text pretty much speaks for itself. Onward!
Plutarch - Themistocles 4
Now in the beginning the Athenians had a custom of dividing up the Laureium revenue from the silver mines; coming before the deme, he alone dared to say that they ought to give up the distribution, and instead use the money to fully equip triremes for the war against Aigina. For this [war] was at an especially strong point in Greece, and the islanders* were controlling the sea with their great number of ships.
In this way Themistocles easily helped to persuade them, not by threatening them with Darius and the Persias--for they were far away and they weren’t causing fear among the populace with their certain arrival in the future--but by the hatred towards the Aigians and by jingoism for their city, he had enough to [to persuade them] opportunely for the preparations. For out of that money they made a hundred triremes, which also fought sea battles against Xerxes.
From this, little by little he was slowly leading the city down towards the sea,** [saying that] the infantry wasn’t equal in battle to their neighbors, and by this strength in ships they would be able to ward off the barbarians and lead Greece, and instead of steadfast hoplites (as Plato calls them), he made them sailors and seafarers; and he brought this charge on himself, that “Themistocles took away the spear and the shield from the citizens, and humbled the people of Athens with the rowing-bench cushion and the oar.”
And he accomplished these things by beating Miltiades in arguments, as Stesimbrotus records. Whether he harmed the perfection and purity of the government or not by doing these things, let that be considered more philosophically; at the time, safety for the Greeks began with the sea, and those triremes restored their city to the Athenians again, and indeed Xerxes gave evidence of the rest.
For with the unbroken power of his infantry remaining, he fled after the defeat of his ships as a man no longer equal in battle; and it seems to me that he left Mardonius*** behind to be in the way of the Greeks’ pursuit more than for enslaving them.
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* That is, the Aiginans. Aegeans? Aginians? Good lord, I can never work out how to transcribe these proper names; the vowels and consonants both go all squirrely from being passed down through Latin for a while.
** Because of the rather vertical geography of a lot of Greece, in Greek moving towards the coast is almost always “down” and away from the sea is “up,” which can render oddly in English when translated literally.
*** Sadly, my footnotes are much more interested in the details of whether or not various aspects of Themistocles’ life could have occurred as Plutarch gives them (often the answer is No) than helping me brush up on the Persian war, so I don’t know who this dude is. Some commander left behind by Xerxes during the retreat, I guess!
Not a lot to say, really; the text pretty much speaks for itself. Onward!
Plutarch - Themistocles 4
Now in the beginning the Athenians had a custom of dividing up the Laureium revenue from the silver mines; coming before the deme, he alone dared to say that they ought to give up the distribution, and instead use the money to fully equip triremes for the war against Aigina. For this [war] was at an especially strong point in Greece, and the islanders* were controlling the sea with their great number of ships.
In this way Themistocles easily helped to persuade them, not by threatening them with Darius and the Persias--for they were far away and they weren’t causing fear among the populace with their certain arrival in the future--but by the hatred towards the Aigians and by jingoism for their city, he had enough to [to persuade them] opportunely for the preparations. For out of that money they made a hundred triremes, which also fought sea battles against Xerxes.
From this, little by little he was slowly leading the city down towards the sea,** [saying that] the infantry wasn’t equal in battle to their neighbors, and by this strength in ships they would be able to ward off the barbarians and lead Greece, and instead of steadfast hoplites (as Plato calls them), he made them sailors and seafarers; and he brought this charge on himself, that “Themistocles took away the spear and the shield from the citizens, and humbled the people of Athens with the rowing-bench cushion and the oar.”
And he accomplished these things by beating Miltiades in arguments, as Stesimbrotus records. Whether he harmed the perfection and purity of the government or not by doing these things, let that be considered more philosophically; at the time, safety for the Greeks began with the sea, and those triremes restored their city to the Athenians again, and indeed Xerxes gave evidence of the rest.
For with the unbroken power of his infantry remaining, he fled after the defeat of his ships as a man no longer equal in battle; and it seems to me that he left Mardonius*** behind to be in the way of the Greeks’ pursuit more than for enslaving them.
---
* That is, the Aiginans. Aegeans? Aginians? Good lord, I can never work out how to transcribe these proper names; the vowels and consonants both go all squirrely from being passed down through Latin for a while.
** Because of the rather vertical geography of a lot of Greece, in Greek moving towards the coast is almost always “down” and away from the sea is “up,” which can render oddly in English when translated literally.
*** Sadly, my footnotes are much more interested in the details of whether or not various aspects of Themistocles’ life could have occurred as Plutarch gives them (often the answer is No) than helping me brush up on the Persian war, so I don’t know who this dude is. Some commander left behind by Xerxes during the retreat, I guess!