HISTORY Of GREECE. lie was doubtless right to a considerable extent; though uof sufficient to repel the charge from himself, which it was his pur. 30th Olympiad. 420 B.C. Lichas the Lacedaemonian also gained 0:10 (Thucyd. v, 50). though the chariot was obliged to be entered in another name, since the Lacedaemonians were interdicted from attendance. Dr. Thirlwall (Hist, of Greece, vol. iii, ch. xxiv, p. 31G) says : "We are not aware that the Olympiad, in which these chariot-victories of Alkibiades were gained, can be distinctly fixed. Bat it was probably Olymp. 89, B.C. 424." In my judgment, both Olymp. 88 (B.C. 428) and Olymp. 89 (B.C. 424) are excluded from the possible supposition, by the fact that the general war was raging at both periods. To suppose that in the midst of the summer of these two fighting years, there was an Olympic truce for a month, allowing Athens and her allies to send thither their solemn legations, their chariots for com- petition, and their numerous individual visitors, appears to me contrary to all probability. The Olympic month of B.C. 424, would occur just about the time when Brasidas was at the Isthmus levying troops for his intended ex- pedition to Thrace, and when he rescued Megara from the Athenian attack. This would not be a very quiet time for the peaceable Athenian visitors, with the costly display of gold and silver plate and the ostentatious theory, to pass by, on its way to Olympia. During the time -.vhen the Spartana occupied Dekeleia, the solemn processions of communicants at the Eleu- sinian mysteries could never march along the Sacred Way from Athens to Eleusis. Xen. Hell, i, 4, 20. Moreover, we see that the very first article both of the Truce for one year and of the Peace of Nikias, expressly stipulate for liberty to all tc attend the common temples and festivals. The first of the two relates U Delphi expressly : the second is general, and embraces Olympia as well ai Delphi. If the Athenians had visited Olympia in 428 or 424 B.C.. without impediment, these stipulations in the treaties would have no purpose nor meaning. But the fact of their standing in the front of the treaty, proves that they were looked upon as of much interest and importance. I have placed the Olympic festival wherein Alkibiades contended with 1 1 is seven chariots, in 420 B.C., in the peace, but immediately after the war. No other festival appears to me at all suitable. Dr. Thirlwall farther assumes, as a matter of course, that there was c.nly me chariot-race at this Olympic festival, that all the seven chariots of Alki- l>iads ran in this one race, and that in the festival of 420 B.C., Lichas pained tlie prize : thus implying that Alkibiades could not have gained the prize at the same festival. I am not aware that there is any evidence to prove either of these thr:? propositions. To me they all appear improbable and unfounded. We know from Pausanias (vi, 13. 2) that even in the case of the itailio-
iromi, or runners who contended in the stadium, all were not brought ou<
