The dates of this war seem to prove that it was
begun more out of ill-temper than as a consequent of any definite
plan; for the peace was ratified in Lacedaemon with the other cities on
the fourteenth of the month Skirophorion; and on the fifth of the next
month, Hekatombaeon, only twenty days afterwards, the Spartans were
defeated at Leuktra. A thousand Lacedaemonians perished, among them
Kleombrotus the king, and with him the flower of the best families in
Sparta. There fell also the handsome son of Sphodrias, Kleonymus, who
fought before the king, and was thrice struck to the ground and rose
again before he was slain by the Thebans.
XXIX. In spite of the unparalleled disaster which had befallen the
Lacedaemonians, for the Theban victory was the most complete ever won
by one Greek state over another, the courage of the vanquished is
nevertheless as much to be admired as that of the victors. Xenophon
remarks that the conversation of good and brave men, even when jesting
or sitting at table, is always worth remembering, and it is much more
valuable to observe how nobly all really brave and worthy men bear
themselves when in sorrow and misfortune. When the news of the defeat
at Leuktra arrived at Sparta, the city was celebrating the festival of
the Gymnopaedia, and the chorus of grown men was going through its
usual solemnity in the theatre. The Ephors, although the news clearly
proved that all was lost and the state utterly ruined, yet would not
permit the chorus to abridge its performance, and forbade the city to
throw off its festal appearance.
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