Latest / Ancient Greece: Philosophy, Democracy, and Endless War — Fexingo History / The Thirty Tyrants: Athens Under Spartan Rule
Transcript
- Lucas: So we've spent a lot of episodes on Athens at war, Athens building democracy, Athens under Pericles. But there's a dark chapter that comes right after the Peloponnesian War ends that we haven't touched yet — the moment when Athens lost its democracy entirely and was ruled by a gang of thirty men backed by Spartan spears. The Thirty Tyrants. Luna: The Thirty Tyrants — that sounds like something out of a fantasy novel, but it was real. Lucas: Completely real. It's 404 BCE. Athens has just surrendered after nearly three decades of war. The city walls are torn down to the sound of flutes, the fleet is reduced to twelve ships, and a Spartan garrison settles into the Acropolis. And then, Lysander — the Spartan admiral — imposes a new government: a board of thirty men, all wealthy Athenians loyal to Sparta, to rewrite the laws. But they never got around to writing laws. They got around to killing people. Luna: How many people did they kill? Lucas: Ancient sources say around 1,500 citizens were executed in the first few months. That's a staggering number for a city of maybe 30,000 adult male citizens. And it wasn't just political enemies — it was anyone with money, anyone who might pose a threat, anyone they didn't like. The Thirty also exiled about 5,000 people. They filled the city with terror. Luna: Who led them? Was there a single tyrant in charge? Lucas: The most prominent figure was Critias. And here's where it gets interesting — Critias had been a student of Socrates. He was an intellectual, a poet, a relative of Plato's mother. But he turned into one of the most ruthless oligarchs in Greek history. Another key member was Theramenes, who had been involved in an earlier oligarchic coup in 411 BCE — the Four Hundred. Theramenes was more moderate, and that cost him his life. Luna: Theramenes was executed by the Thirty, right? Luna: Dark humour even at the end. So did the Thirty rule for long? Lucas: Only about eight months — from the fall of 404 BCE to the spring of 403 BCE. But it felt much longer to the Athenians. The terror had a specific method: the Thirty enrolled 3,000 citizens as 'the privileged' who could bear arms and participate in a limited assembly. Everyone else was disarmed. Then they started purging the metics — resident foreigners — because they had money. They killed many wealthy metics and seized their houses. One of their enforcers was a cavalry corps made up of young aristocratic Athenians loyal to the regime. Luna: So who finally stopped them? Lucas: A man named Thrasybulus. He had been an admiral during the war, a democrat. He fled Athens and gathered a small band of exiles at a fortress called Phyle, on the border with Boeotia. At first he had only about seventy men. But they raided, gathered support, and soon had a thousand. They marched to Piraeus, the port of Athens, and in a battle at Munychia, they defeated the forces of the Thirty. Critias was killed in that battle. The Thirty then fled to Eleusis, but the democrats surrounded them. In the end, a Spartan king named Pausanias — not the same one from the Persian Wars — negotiated a settlement. Luna: And that settlement is famous for its amnesty, isn't it? Lucas: Exactly. The amnesty of 403 BCE. The democrats, now back in power, swore an oath: 'I will not recall past wrongs.' It was a general amnesty for everyone except the Thirty themselves and a few of their top officials. Even the cavalrymen who had served the tyrants were allowed to stay — as long as they underwent a review. This amnesty became a cornerstone of Athenian democracy. It prevented a cycle of revenge killings that would have torn the city apart. Aristotle later praised it as the key to restoring stability. Luna: So after all that bloodshed, Athens chose forgiveness over vengeance. That's remarkable. Lucas: It is. And it worked. Democracy was restored, and Athens never fell to another oligarchic coup. But the memory of the Thirty haunted the city for generations. In fact, Socrates' association with Critias and another of the Thirty, Charmides, was later used against him at his trial in 399 BCE. The jury remembered that his students had become tyrants. So in a way, the shadow of the Thirty reached all the way to Socrates' hemlock cup. Luna: That's a connection I hadn't made — Socrates' trial is just four years after the Thirty fell. The fear of oligarchy was still fresh. Lucas: Speaking of that fear and the struggle to keep democracy alive, it's a good moment to mention that this kind of deep history — the stories of how fragile freedom can be — is exactly what we try to bring to life here. And if you've been walking through these ancient streets with us, from Marathon to the Pnyx to the Thirty Tyrants, and you find value in this ad-free, deeply researched conversation, there's a simple way to support the show. Luna: We keep it ad-free because of listeners who chip in. It's like the ancient liturgy system — citizens funding triremes for the common good. Lucas: Exactly. If you'd like to be part of that, you can go to buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo. No pressure, just a way to keep these conversations going without commercial breaks. And now back to Athens — the democracy that survived the tyrants and learned to forgive. Luna: So after the amnesty, did the democrats make any changes to prevent something like the Thirty from happening again? Lucas: Yes, they did. They introduced a law — attributed to a man named Demophantus — that made anyone who overthrew the democracy a public enemy, to be killed with impunity. They also formalized the procedure of graphe paranomon, a legal challenge against any law proposed in the assembly that contradicted existing laws. It was a way to prevent sudden, unconstitutional changes. The experience of the Thirty left deep institutional scars, but also made the democracy more resilient. Luna: And they rebuilt the Long Walls, too, didn't they? Lucas: They did — the walls connecting Athens to Piraeus were rebuilt within a few years, thanks to Persian subsidies that Conon, the Athenian admiral, secured after the battle of Knidos in 394 BCE. So Athens rose again. But the memory of those eight months stayed: a reminder that democracy, even in its birthplace, is never guaranteed.