Theramenes
Theramenes was an Athenian military leader and statesman, prominent in the final decade of the Peloponnesian War. He was active during the two periods of oligarchic government at Athens, the 400 and later the Thirty Tyrants, as well as in the trial of the generals who had commanded at Arginusae in 406 BC. A moderate oligarch, he often found himself caught between the democrats on the one hand and the extremist oligarchs on the other. Successful in replacing a narrow oligarchy with a broader one in 411 BC, he failed to achieve the same end in 404 BC, and was executed by the extremists whose policies he had opposed.
Historical record
No ancient biographies of Theramenes are known, but his life and actions are relatively well documented, due to the extensive treatment given him in several surviving works. The Attic orator Lysias deals with him at length in several of his speeches, albeit in a very hostile manner. Theramenes also appears in several ancient narrative histories: Thucydides' account includes the beginnings of Theramenes' career, and Xenophon, picking up where Thucydides left off, gives a detailed account of several episodes from Theramenes' later life, including a sympathetic and vivid description of his last actions and words; Diodorus Siculus, probably drawing his account mostly from Ephorus, provides another account that varies widely from Xenophon's at several points. Theramenes also appears in several other sources, which, although they do not provide as many narrative details, have been used to illuminate the political disputes which surrounded Theramenes' life and memory.Family
Only the barest outlines of Theramenes' life outside the public sphere have been preserved in the historical record. His father, Hagnon had played a significant role in Athenian public life in the decades before Theramenes' appearance on the scene. He had commanded the group of Greek colonists who founded Amphipolis in 437–6 BC, had served as a general on several occasions before and during the Peloponnesian War, and was one of the signers of the Peace of Nicias. Hagnon's career overlapped with his son's when he served as one of the ten commissioners appointed by the government of the 400 to draft a new constitution in 411 BC.Coup of 411 BC
Overthrow of the democracy
Theramenes' first appearance in the historical record comes with his involvement in the oligarchic coup of 411 BC. In the wake of the Athenian defeat in Sicily, revolts began to break out among Athens' subject states in the Aegean Sea and the Peace of Nicias fell apart; the Peloponnesian War resumed in full by 412 BC. In this context, a number of Athenian aristocrats, led by Peisander and with Theramenes prominent among their ranks, began to conspire to overthrow the city's democratic government. This intrigue was initiated by the exiled nobleman Alcibiades, who was at that time acting as an assistant to the Persian satrap Tissaphernes. Claiming that he had great influence with Tissaphernes, Alcibiades promised to return to Athens, bringing Persian support with him, if the democracy that had exiled him were replaced with an oligarchy. Accordingly, a number of trierarchs and other leaders of the Athenian army at Samos began planning the overthrow of the democracy. They eventually dispatched Peisander to Athens, where, by promising that the return of Alcibiades and an alliance with Persia would follow if the Athenians would replace their democracy with an oligarchy, he persuaded the Athenian ecclesia to send him as an emissary to Alcibiades, authorized to make whatever arrangements were necessary.Alcibiades, however, did not succeed in persuading the satrap to ally with the Athenians, and, to hide this fact, demanded greater and greater concessions of them until they finally refused to comply. Disenchanted with Alcibiades but still determined to overthrow the democracy, Peisander and his companions returned to Samos, where the conspirators worked to secure their control over the army and encouraged a group of native Samian oligarchs to begin planning the overthrow of their own city's democracy. In Athens, meanwhile, a party of young oligarchic revolutionaries succeeded in gaining de facto control of the government through assassination and intimidation.
After making arrangements to their satisfaction at Samos the leaders of the conspiracy set sail for Athens. Among them was Theramenes; Thucydides refers to him as "one of the leaders of the party that put down the democracy—an able speaker and a man with ideas." Calling the assembly together, the conspirators proposed a series of measures by which the democracy was formally replaced with a government of 400 chosen men, who were to select and convene a larger body of 5,000 as time went on. Shortly afterwards, the conspirators went, under arms, to the council chamber, where they ordered the democratic council to disperse after collecting their pay; the council did as ordered, and from this point forward the mechanism of government was fully under the control of the oligarchic conspirators; they quickly changed the laws to reflect the new form of government they had imposed.
Image:Hoplite1.gif|thumb|left|A Greek hoplite.
In 411 BC, Theramenes argued for a government in which all men of hoplite status or higher would be enfranchised.
Conflict within the movement
At this point, several conflicts began to develop that threatened the future of the new government at Athens. First, the planned coup at Samos was thwarted by the efforts of Samian democrats and a group of Athenians who they entrusted with helping them. When the army at Samos heard the news of the coup at Athens, which arrived along with exaggerated reports of outrages being perpetrated by the new government, they declared their loyalty to democracy and hostility to the new government. At Athens, meanwhile, a split developed between the moderate and radical oligarchs, with Theramenes emerging alongside one Aristocrates son of Scelias as the leader of the moderate faction. The extremist faction, led by Phrynichus, containing such prominent leaders of the coup as Peisander and Antiphon, and dominant within the 400, opposed broadening the base of the oligarchy, and were willing to seek peace with Sparta on almost any terms. The moderates, on the other hand, although willing to seek peace with Sparta on terms that would preserve Athens' power, were not willing to sacrifice the empire and the fleet, and wanted to broaden the oligarchy to include the putative 5,000, presumably including all men of hoplite status or higher.Shortly after taking power, the extremist leaders of the revolution had begun constructing fortifications on Eëtioneia, a dominant point in the entrance to the harbor of Piraeus, ostensibly to protect the harbor against an attack from the fleet at Samos. With internal dissent increasing, they joined these new fortifications to existing walls to form a redoubt defensible against attacks from land or sea, which contained a large warehouse into which the extremists moved most of the city's grain supply. Theramenes protested strongly against the building of this fortification, arguing that its purpose was not to keep the democrats out, but to be handed over to the Spartans; Thucydides testifies that his charges were not without substance, as the extremists were actually contemplating such an action. Initially cautious, Theramenes and his party were emboldened and galvanized into action by several events. First, a Peloponnesian fleet, ostensibly dispatched to assist anti-Athenian forces on Euboea, was moving slowly up the coast of the Peloponnese; Theramenes charged that this fleet was planning to seize the fortifications on Eetioneia, in collaboration with the extremists. Second, an Athenian militiaman, apparently acting on orders from conspirators higher in the ranks of the government, assassinated Phrynichus, the leader of the extremist faction. He escaped, but his accomplice, an Argive, was captured; the prisoner, under torture, refused to state the name of his employer. With the extremists unable to take effective action in this case, and with the Peloponnesian fleet overrunning Aegina, Theramenes and his party decided to act.
Aristocrates, who was commanding a regiment of hoplites in Piraeus, arrested the extremist general Alexicles; enraged, the extremist leaders of the 400 demanded action, and made a number of threats against Theramenes and his party. To their surprise, Theramenes volunteered to lead a force to rescue Alexicles; the leaders of the extremists acquiesced, and Theramenes set out to Piraeus, sharing his command with one other moderate and one extremist, Aristarchus. When Theramenes and his force arrived at Piraeus, Aristarchus, in a rage, exhorted the men to attack the hoplites who had seized Alexicles. Theramenes feigned rage as well, but when asked by the hoplites whether he thought that the fortification on Eetioneia was a good idea, he responded that if they wanted to pull it down, he thought that would be good. Calling out that everyone who wanted the 5,000 to govern instead of the 400, the hoplites set to work. Donald Kagan has suggested that this call was probably instigated by Theramenes' party, who wanted the 5,000 to govern; the hoplites tearing down the fortification might well have preferred a return to the democracy. Several days later, the Peloponnesian fleet approached Piraeus, but, finding the fortifications destroyed and the port well defended, they sailed on to Euboea. Several days later, the 400 were formally deposed and replaced by a government of the 5,000; the most extreme of the oligarchs fled the city.
In command
Under the government of the 5,000 and under the democracy that replaced it in 410 BC, Theramenes served as a general for several years, commanding fleets in the Aegean Sea and the Hellespont. Shortly after the rise of the government of the 5,000, Theramenes set sail to the Hellespont to join Thrasybulus and the generals elected by the army at Samos. After the Athenian victory at Abydos, he took thirty triremes to attack the rebels on Euboea, who were building a causeway to Boeotia to provide land access to their island. Unable to stop the construction, he plundered the territory of several rebellious cities, then travelled around the Aegean suppressing oligarchies and raising funds from various cities of the Athenian Empire. He then took his fleet to Macedon, where he assisted the Macedonian king Archelaus in his siege of Pydna, but, with that siege dragging on, he sailed on to join Thrasybulus in Thrace. The fleet soon moved on from there to challenge Mindarus' fleet, which had seized the city of Cyzicus. Theramenes commanded one wing of the Athenian fleet in the resulting Battle of Cyzicus, a decisive Athenian victory. In that battle, Alcibiades led a decoy force that drew the Spartan fleet out into open water, while Thrasybulus and Theramenes, each commanding an independent squadron, cut off the Spartans' retreat. Mindarus was forced to flee to a nearby beach, and vicious fighting ensued on land as the Athenians attempted to drag off the Spartan ships. Thrasybulus and Alcibiades kept the Spartans occupied while Theramenes joined up with the nearby Athenian land forces and then hurried to the rescue; his arrival precipitated a total Athenian victory, in which all the Spartan ships were captured. In the wake of this victory, the Athenians captured Cyzicus and constructed a fort at Chrysopolis, from which they extracted a customs duty of one tenth on all ships passing through the Bosporus. Theramenes and another general remained at this fort with a garrison of thirty ships to oversee the collection of the duty. At Athens, meanwhile, the government of the 5,000 was replaced by a restored democracy within a few months of this battle; Donald Kagan has suggested that the absence of Theramenes, "the best spokesman for the moderates", paved the way for this restoration.According to Diodorus and Plutarch, Theramenes participated under the command of Alcibiades to the siege of Byzantium, winning the battle against the Peloponnesian army that was appointed to defend that city: Alcibiades was in command of the right wing, while Theramenes was in charge of the left one.