Klearchus

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Klearchus (around 450 BC; † 401 BC ), son of Ramphias, was a Spartan naval leader in the Peloponnesian War .

In 411 BC In BC he was sent to the Hellespont, in cooperation with the Persian satrap Pharnabazos, to dispute control of the straits with the Athenians. In 410 he took part in the battle of Kyzikos as a troop leader . As the Harmost of Byzantion he led 408 BC. The defense of the city against the Athenians Alkibiades and Theramenes . During the siege, Klearchus left the city on a ship with which he broke the naval blockade, and thus encouraged the Athenian friends in Byzantium, who soon afterwards played the city into the hands of Alcibiades. 406 BC He was involved in the battle of the Arginus as deputy of the sea ​​lord Kallikratidas .

After the end of the Peloponnesian War, he ignored an order from the Spartan government and was sentenced to death. However, he found refuge with the Persian Prince Cyrus . For this he led the Greek mercenary army when the rebellious Cyrus wanted to dispute the crown for his brother Artaxerxes II .

The mercenary army under Klearchus was victorious in the battle of Kunaxa , but due to the death of Cyrus, who stormed recklessly forward, the Greeks suddenly found themselves alone and without commission in the middle of the hostile Achaemenid Empire . In the subsequent armistice negotiations with the Persians, Klearchus and his fellow generals were treacherously murdered a little later as a result of an intrigue by the oath-breaking Persian satrap Tissaphernes . The Greek army , under the leadership of the Spartan Cheirisophos and the Athenian intellectual Xenophon , a student of Socrates who eventually assumed the role of a troop leader, was nevertheless able to fight the way out of Persia, as in the Anabasis (also known as "Train of the Ten Thousand") Xenophons described.

Xenophon characterizes Klearchus as a militarily capable, but also war-addicted person, "who prefers war despite the possibility of living in peace without shame and harm".

swell

  • Thucydides, The Peloponnesian War (VIII 8, 39, 80)
  • Xenophon, Hellenika (I 1.35; 3.15 ff.)
  • Xenophon, Anabasis (Characteristic: II 6.1 ff.)

literature

  • Otto Lendle : Commentary on Xenophon's Anabasis . Scientific Book Society, Darmstadt 1995.
personal data
SURNAME Klearchus
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Spartan fleet leader
DATE OF BIRTH around 450 BC Chr.
DATE OF DEATH 401 BC Chr.