Persian Fire (23 page)

that Megacles, the archon who had tricked Cylon's followers from their temple sanctuary to their deaths, had been willing to risk the taint of sacrilege — for he had been head of the Alcmaeonids, one of the grandest of all Athenian clans, descended from a king, proud and high-aspiring, and certainly no man's slave. And, to be sure, the penalty he and all his family paid had been a terrible one. Even in defence of freedom, a crime such as Megacles had committed against the gods could not be readily forgiven. It had taken a full thirty years of furious foot-dragging by the Alcmaeonids before they were finally brought to court; but Megacles' clan, in the end, around 600
bc
, had all been sentenced to exile in perpetuity.
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The mouldering bones of their ancestors had been dug up and dumped beyond the borders of the city. The Alcmaeonids had become a family accursed.

But even absent from Athens, they continued to cast a long and glamorous shadow. Indeed, if anything, the curse only contributed to their menacing allure. It was typical of the Alcmaeonids' cool effrontery that the moment they were exiled they entered into a hugely profitable relationship of mutual back-scratching with — of all people — the priests at Delphi. Megacles' son Alcmaeon, displaying a particularly shameless aptitude for hypocrisy, led the campaign against the sacrilegious city of Crisa. He then successfully wangled himself into serving as the middle-man between the grateful oracle and King Croesus, and reaped fabulous rewards — for Croesus was so pleased with his agent's diplomacy that he invited him to visit the royal treasury in Sardis and take away all the gold that he could carry.
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Alcmaeon capitalised on this offer, it was said, by wearing a baggy woman's tunic and the loosest boots that he could find, and then filling them with gold-dust; so that 'when he came staggering out, he could scarcely drag one foot after the other, his tunic bulged obscenely, and even his cheeks were stuffed full to bursting'.
²³

Still the Alcmaeonids' gaze remained fixed longingly on their native city, even though the view by the 560s
bc
had become an increasingly discouraging one. Athens in that decade seemed firmly under the thumb of a Eupatrid of immense hauteur, Lycurgus, head of the Boutads, a clan of such impeccable breeding that it could claim descent from the brother of Erechtheus himself. This bloodline provided Lycurgus with an almost proprietary claim on the Acropolis — a perk which, with the eye of a natural impresario, he had exploited to the full. Lycurgus, almost certainly, had been responsible for the construction of the massive ramp leading to the summit, and for the inauguration of the city's premier new festival, the Great Panathenaea. Indisputably, he officiated in the most venerable temple on the entire Acropolis, that of Athena Polias, the 'Guardian of the City'.
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Modest and old fashioned this shrine may have been, but it contained within its murk an object of incalculable holiness: a statue that had fallen from the sky in far-off times, a self-portrait fashioned out of olive wood by Athena herself.
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Ramp, festival, idol: Lycurgus' fingerprints were over them all. Staged for the first time in 566
bc,
and then every four years after that, whenever the Great Panathenaea was held, a great procession would climb the ramp to the temple of Athena and present to the statue, which was already wearing around its neck a golden gorgon's head, a beautifully embroidered robe, woven by the noblest maidens of the city. Hoplites and cavalrymen, venerable elders and young girls, even foreigners resident in the city, all would take their places in the spectacular cavalcade. A show, in short, that provided the Boutads with publicity to die for.

Not that Lycurgus was the only headline act in the 560s
bc
. Amid all the excitement of the festivities back in Athens, a general by the name of Pisistratus was at last bringing to an end the running embarrassment of the war for Salamis. Although he certainly did not lack for connections — he was even said to have been Solon's beloved as a boy — Pisistratus had no illusions that he could challenge the Boutads when it came to snob-appeal. By the end of the decade, however, with Megara defeated and Salamis at last securely in Athenian hands, he had fostered a formidable prestige. Not merely a war hero, Pisistratus was also a charmer and a schemer, blessed with the popular touch, and possessed of a rare eye for the opportunities created by Solon's reforms. Having first cast himself as the spokesman for the poorest of the rural poor, he then faked a dramatic assault upon himself, and appealed to the Assembly for bodyguards. Despite the lucubrations of Solon, his by now ancient former lover, who emerged from retirement to warn banefully of a looming tyranny, Pisistratus was given what he had requested — and promptly occupied the Acropolis.

The Alcmaeonids, still in exile, but sniffing the air, now suddenly smelled their chance. Feelers were put out to the Boutads; Lycurgus, stunned by the coup into a dramatic reappraisal of his objections to an Alcmaeonid return, found himself hurriedly swallowing them. A rapprochement between the two great clans was duly concocted. Against such a heavyweight pairing, there was little that Pisistratus could do. His position began to crumble by the day. Rather than make a doomed stand, as Cylon had done, he opted to cut his losses and scarper into exile.

Perhaps, however, amid the seeming ruin of all his hopes, Pisistratus was able to reassure himself that his time would come again. He must have calculated that the Alcmaeonids — devious, arrogant and obscenely wealthy — would hardly make easy partners for anyone. Whatever the precise terms of their agreement with Lycurgus, it appeared unlikely that they would rest content with playing second fiddle to him for long. And, sure enough, no sooner had they returned to Athens than the Alcmaeonids were fixing their calculating gaze upon that natural stage for self-advertisement, the Acropolis, and tapping their reserves of Lydian gold. It appears probable, at the very least, that an immense stone temple raised around this time, and the first of such a scale built on the Acropolis, was the work of the Alcmaeonids.
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Who else would have had the resources — or the motive — to sponsor such a project? Lavishly decorated, with brightly painted snakes, and bulls, and lions, with fish-tailed Tritons, and triple-bodied men with trim blue beards, the temple could hardly have been a more flamboyant statement of intent. Certainly, it put the shabby old shrine of Athena Polias, and the Boutads with it, thoroughly in the shade.

But new, in the opinion of the Athenians, was not necessarily best. The Alcmaeonids' temple may have been spectacular, but it lacked what gave the older shrine its peculiar sanctity: the presence of Athena herself. By the mid-550s, as the relationship between Alcmaeonids and Boutads turned increasingly bitter, the former were beginning to cast around for a fresh way to trump Lycurgus, and claim the favour of Athena for themselves. They found it, with a fine display of opportunism, in alliance with the very man they had driven into exile barely five years previously - and the concoction of a wonderfully far-fetched plot. First, to cement the dynastic alliance, Pisistratus was obliged to separate from his wife, a blue-blooded Argive by the name of Timonassa, and marry into the Alcmaeonid clan. Next, returning to Attica, he headed to a village just south of Mount Pentelikon. A flower-seller lived there, a towering woman of exceptional beauty, with the apt name of Phye - 'Stature'. Pisistratus, adorning this peasant woman with the helmet and armour of Athena and placing her in a chariot, had her driven on the road that led to Athens, with messengers going before them both, proclaiming that the goddess was leading her favourite in person to the Acropolis. An outrageous stunt — but Pisistratus somehow pulled it off. No one thought to laugh at the procession; rather, all flocked to gawp at it. To many Athenians, awestruck by the spectacle of a goddess riding through the streets of their city, it seemed a magical and wondrous epiphany; to others, watching as the chariot wound its way to the Acropolis, a dazzling piece of theatre. After all, not even that consummate showman Lycurgus had thought to have Athena appear in person to grace his temple. The Alcmaeonids had, in every sense, pulled off a coup.

And Pisistratus, having captured the Acropolis a second time, had already outlived his usefulness to them. Smoothly stabbing their inlaw in the back, the Alcmaeonids began to circulate a shocking rumour.
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Not only, it was whispered, had Pisistratus been denying his wife the pleasures that were the due of any bride; he had also, like the monster he self-evidently was, been sating his own desires upon her pure-bred body in loathsome and unnatural ways. Family honour, once Athens was buzzing with the scandal, positively obliged the Alcmaeonids to turn on their erstwhile partner; even if it meant building bridges with Lycurgus, their erstwhile foe. Pisistratus, once again confronted by an alliance of the city's two most powerful families, retreated hurriedly into a second ignominious exile. Athens was left, as before, in the hands of the Alcmaeonids and the Boutads. This time, however, there could be no doubt as to which was the pre-eminent clan.

But in double-crossing Pisistratus, the Alcmaeonids had sorely underestimated their man. Indeed, by using him and then dropping him in so perfidious a manner, they had provided him with an invaluable master-class in the darker political arts. Pisistratus, over the next decade, would show that he had learned the lesson well. Somehow persuading the jilted Timonassa to return to him, he also succeeded in patching up his friendship with her relatives back in Argos. Wealthy backers in Thebes were similarly charmed into giving him sponsorship. A fortune was raised, and an invasion force recruited. By 546
bc,
Pisistratus was ready. He and his men landed on the shallow beaches at Marathon. Here he was assured of a warm welcome — for the Pisistratids had always had close family links with the villages on the plain. The Alcmaeonids appear not to have been unduly alarmed. Taking the southern road around Mount Pentelikon, they led an army in a desultory manner as far as the village of Pallene. There, in a manner that spoke loudly of their contempt for their former stooge, they halted to have their lunch, even though Pisistratus was closing in. The engagement, when it came, was a rout: the Athenians, surprised mid-snack by an army that included both Theban cavalry and a thousand crack Argive hoplites, turned and fled in a rabble back to Athens. Left behind in the dust of Pallene lay at least one Alcmaeonid, killed 'in the front line of battle'.
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The surviving members of the family, rather than returning with their defeated army to Athens, there to await the vengeance of Pisistratus, fled across the Attic border — exiles once again.

Pisistratus himself, meanwhile, relishing his triumph, continued his advance on Athens. It hardly needed a goddess now to proclaim him her favourite. Once again he climbed the great ramp that led to the Acropolis and took possession of the summit. Surpassingly gracious, Pisistratus then informed his fellow citizens 'that they should not be alarmed or downcast, but should go and attend to their private business, leaving all the burdens of state for him to shoulder'.
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The Athenians, in acknowledgement of their submission, turned and did as their new master had instructed, reckoning - and relieved, perhaps -that this time the tyrant was surely there to stay.