142 HISTORY OF GREECE. assist the Zakynthians, 1 while plans were formed for the acquisi tion of the more important island of Korkyra. The fleet of Timotheus having now been removed home, a malcontent Korky rasan party formed a conspiracy to introduce the Lacedaemonian? as friends, and betray the island to them. A Lacedaemonian fleet of twenty-two triremes accordingly sailed thither, under color of a voyage to Sicily. But the Korkyraean government, having de- tected the plot, refused to receive them, took precautions for defence, and sent envoys to Athens to entreat assistance. The Lacedaemonians now resolved to attack Korkyra openly, with the full naval force of their confederacy. By the joint efforts of Sparta, Corinth, Leukas, Ambrakia, Elis, Zakynthus, Achaia, Epidaurus, Troezen, Hermione, and Halieis, strengthened by 1 Xen. Hellen. vi, 2, 3 ; Diodor. xv, 45. The statements of Diodorus are not clear in themselves ; besides that on some points, though not in the main, they contradict Xenophon. Diodorus states that those exiles whom Timotheus brought back to Zakynthus, were the philo-Spartan leaders, who had been recently expelled for their misrule under the empire of Sparta. This statement must doubtless be incorrect The exiles whom Timotheus restored must have belonged to the anti-Spar- tan party in the island. But Diodorus appears to me to have got into confusion by representing that universal and turbulent reaction against the philo-Spartan oligarchies, which really did not take place until after the battle of Leuktra as if it had taken place some three years earlier. The events recounted in Diodor. xv, 40, seem to me to belong to a period after the battle of Leuktra. Diodorus also seems to have made a mistake in saying that the Athe- nians sent Ktesikles as auxiliary commander to Zakynthus (xv, '46) ; whereas this very commander is announced by himself in the next chapter (as well as by Xenophon, who calls him Stesikles) as sent to Korkyra (Hellen. v, 2, 10). I conceive Diodorus to have inadvertently mentioned this Athenian ex- pedition under Stesikles or Ktesikles, twice over ; once as sent to Zakyn- thus then again, as sent to Korkyra. The latter is the truth. No Athe nian expedition at all appears on this occasion to have gone to Zakynthus ; for Xenophon enumerates the Zakynthians among those who helped to fit out the fleet of Mnasippus (v, 2, 3). On the other hand, I see no reason for calling in question the reality of the two Lacedaemonian expeditions, in the last half of 374 B.C. one under Aristokrates to Zakynthus, the oth'er under Alkidas to Korkyra which Diodorus mentions (Diod. xv, 45, 46). It is true that Xenophon does not notice either of them ; but they arc noway inconsistent with the facts which be does state.
