Eurymedon (strategist)

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Eurymedon , Thukles' son, ( Greek  Εὐρυμέδων ; * around 470 BC; † 413 BC ) was a politician and general in classical Athens at the time of the Peloponnesian War (431–404 BC). He was a participant in the Sicilian expedition and fell in the penultimate sea battle in the port of Syracuse .

The historian Thucydides first mentions Eurymedon as the commander of an Attic fleet that was founded in 427 BC. Was involved in the civil war on the island of Kerkyra . There Eurymedon brought the democrats to power and, despite promises to the contrary, tolerated their pogrom against the oligarchic minority.

In 425 BC In BC Eurymedon led an expedition to Sicily together with his colleague Sophocles, which was diverted to Messenia by Demosthenes who was traveling with him. After Demosthenes had fortified the rock of Pylos , the fleet under the command of Eurymedon and Sophocles defeated a roughly equally strong Spartan fleet in a sea ​​battle in the port of Pylos .

Then the Attic fleet blocked a cut off Spartan garrison on the island of Sphakteria . After an armistice expired, the Athenians, who had made the extradition of the Spartan ships a condition, refused to return them as agreed.

After the Spartans were captured by Kleon and Demosthenes, the fleet finally continued on its way and reached Kerkyra, where a second bloodbath among the oligarchs broke out again, for which the two generals Eurymedon and Sophocles were at least partly responsible according to the judgment of Thucydides .

Once in Sicily, the Athenian fleet was unable to achieve any of the goals set because the Sicilian cities made peace with one another under the impression of the impending invasion. The Attic generals, who did not oppose the general peace agreement, were charged with bribery on their return in Athens. While his two colleagues Pythodorus and Sophocles were banished, Eurymedon got away with a fine. However, he then fell out of favor and was not entrusted with any command for ten years.

The Athenians only remembered his military competence again when their second Sicilian expedition under the command of Nicias in 414 BC. Chr. Got into distress. So in the winter of 414/413 BC. An auxiliary expedition under the command of the experienced generals Demosthenes and Eurymedon. Eurymedon brought the urgently needed wages to Sicily in the winter and then returned to Kerkyra, where he united with the main contingent under Demosthenes and raised other ship crews and troops.

After arriving at Syracuse in the summer of 413, Eurymedon was one of the commanders, along with Demosthenes and Menandros, in the night storm on the heights of Epipolai. After their defeat he supported Demosthenes' demand for immediate withdrawal. But they could not prevail against Nikias, who feared an indictment by the people's assembly in Athens.

In the subsequent naval battle in the port of Syracuse, Eurymedon commanded the right wing of the Athenians. When he stretched his line too much to encompass him, he was cut off by the ships of the Syracusan Admiral Agatharchos, thrown onto the land and killed.

The historian Thucydides, who himself had a military command during the Peloponnesian War, describes in his account three episodes in which the Athenians broke their word with the participation of Eurymedon. It is no longer possible to precisely determine whether this accumulation is due to chance or a precise charge. At least in the third example, however, the historian explicitly names the broken commanders as jointly responsible for the bloody escalation of the civil war in Kerkyra.

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literature

  • Franz Kiechle: Eurymedon 4. In: The Little Pauly (KlP). Volume 2, Stuttgart 1967, column 454.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Thucydides, III 80-85.
  2. ↑ Thucydides, IV 13 f.
  3. ↑ Thucydides, IV 23.
  4. ^ Thucydides, IV 46-48.
  5. ^ Thucydides, IV 65.
  6. ↑ Thucydides, VII 16 and 31; Plutarch , Nicias , 20.
  7. ↑ Thucydides, VII 42-44 and 49; Diodorus , XIII 11th
  8. ↑ Thucydides, VII 52; Diodor, XIII 13,2-4.
  9. ^ Thucydides, IV 48.
personal data
SURNAME Eurymedon
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Athenian general
DATE OF BIRTH around 470 BC Chr.
DATE OF DEATH 413 BC Chr.
Place of death Syracuse