Agesilaos & the Crisis of Sparta
Though hymned by writers as an exemplum of Sparta's virtue, was Agesilaos the author as well as the spectator of her decline and fall?
Polybius, the great Greek historian of the second century BC, lived in a world dominated by a few large territorial monarchies. As often, his methodological prescription for the proper historical treatment of monarchs hit the nail on the head:
We should neither praise kings nor blame them without due regard for the truth (as has so frequently been done), but should always write of them consistently in the light of our previous statements, and in accordance with their conduct and policy.
The conduct and policy of Agesilaos, who reigned from about 400-360 BC have provoked violently contradictory and often distressingly prejudiced judgments from his day to our own.
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