72 HISTORY OF GREECE. do not know. But the presumptions are all unfavorable, seeing that their situation as well as their power was analogous to that of the Thirty at Athens and the Lysandrian Dekarchies else- where. The surrender of Olynthus to Polybiades, and of Phlius tc Agesilaus, seem to have taken place nearly at the same time. CHAPTER LXXVII. FROM THE SUBJUGATION OF OLYNTHUS BY THE LACEDJEMO NIANS DOWN TO THE CONGRESS AT SPARTA, AND PARTIAL PEACE, IN 371 B. C. AT the beginning of 379 B. c., the empire of the Lacedaemo- nians on land had reached a pitch never before paralleled. On the sea, their fleet was but moderately powerful, and they seem to have held divided empire with Athens over the smaller islands ; while the larger islands (so far as we can make out) were inde- pendent of both. But the whole of inland Greece, both within and without Peloponnesus, except Argos, Attica, and perhaps the more powerful Thessalian cities, was now enrolled in the confederacy dependent on Sparta. Her occupation of Thebes, by a Spartan garrison and an oligarchy of local partisans, appeared to place her empire beyond all chance of successful attack ; while the victorious close of the war against Olynthus carried every- where an intimidating sense of her far-reaching power. Her al- lies, too, governed as they were in many cases by Spartan har- mosts, and by oligarchies whose power rested on Sparta, were much more dependent upon her than they had been during the time of the Peloponnesian war. Such a position of affairs rendered Sparta an object of the same mingled fear and hatred (the first preponderant) as had been felt towards imperial Athens fifty years before, when she was desig- nated as the " despot city. 1 " And this sentiment was farther 1 Thucyd. i, 124. noTiiv rvpavvov.
