Leonidas approached the empty throne, seeing in his memory his father, hunched over the writing table with his thinning white hair revealing a scalp covered with age spots. He had put an arm around Leonidas’ frail shoulders and pulled him close. At the time Leonidas had been very uncomfortable: his father was a stranger to him, and he seemed as ancient as the Gods themselves. “Here is a page of writing,” his father had said, showing him the document he was then reading. Leonidas had nodded quickly, by then only interested in a hasty retreat. “And here is your name,” his father had said, pointing to a row of letters. Leonidas had peered at the paper with new interest. His father had ruffled his hair, which had annoyed him, and he’d squirmed in his father’s arm, trying to break free.
The adult Leonidas wished he hadn’t done that. In retrospect, it was the only time in their lives that they had been alone together. Otherwise, one of his brothers or his mother or the nurses had always been present when he encountered his father.
“Is something the matter, my lord?” Eukomos asked, baffled that Leonidas was just standing and staring at the throne.
Leonidas shook the memories away, mentally promising to offer a prayer for his father’s shade when he made his first sacrifice to Apollo as king. He had never prayed for his father before. He had never particularly thought about him at all. But his father had put him in the place of honor. No one would ever know if it was because he was the firstborn―or simply because the dying Anaxandridas had secretly liked Leonidas better.
“My lord?” Eukomos prompted again.
Leonidas sat down on his father’s throne. Eukomos spread out a stack of papyrus and weighted it at both ends. The first page was covered with columns of tiny, regular, neat writing. “This is an inventory of arable properties, acres of timber,” he pointed to the appropriate column for each item, “livestock by breed, houses, factories, and so on―right to this last column, which is the inventory of your treasury in gold and silver objects, with the total weight by precious metal noted here.”
Leonidas’ eyes worked their way slowly across the tiny columns of figures. He did not try to add up everything mentally, but he was no longer as unfamiliar with bookkeeping as he had been when he first came into his inheritance. Gorgo might have day-to-day responsibility for his finances, but he retained an overview of his possessions and a rough understanding of what things were worth. He looked up and straight at the elegant perioikoi manager. “This is―scandalous.”
Eukomos was taken completely by surprise. He had, until an hour earlier, expected to be facing Brotus. Brotus, he was certain, would have been impatient with the details, but pleased with the bottom line. Leonidas responded exactly the reverse, and it startled him. “My lord?”
Leonidas leaned back against the swans and looked at the old steward. He could remember vividly the day, shortly before he attained citizenship, when Eukomos had summoned him to the palace to reveal his inheritance. Brotus had been summoned, too, of course, because their father had ordained that the twins receive equal portions, but left it to his trustees to make the actual allocation. Brotus had not wanted any of the shares in factories, quarries, and the like, dismissing them as beneath his dignity. Brotus saw himself as a landowner and soldier only; he viewed trade and manufacturing as demeaning. Brotus had insisted on swapping these holdings for estates from Leonidas’ share. Leonidas had agreed because he thought shares of things managed by perioikoi would be less trouble to him, but Eukomos thought it was because he knew the shares were more valuable than the land.
Eukomos, Leonidas calculated, must be over sixty now. He was almost completely bald, with only a thin fringe of hair at the base of his skull. His aquiline nose seemed sharper than ever, and he was dressed in beautifully patterned, loosely flowing linen. He wore several rings on each hand and was nervously twisting one, despite an expression of perfect calm.
“This inventory suggests that the Agiad royal house is obscenely rich. If the Eurypontids are as rich, it is no wonder hundreds of citizens are living on marginal estates and that many are unable to pay their syssitia fees. This is in blatant contradiction of Lycurgus’ laws.”
“No, my lord,” Eukomos answered in a crisp yet defensive tone. “Lycurgus’ laws never applied to the kings, and never to Messenia.”
Leonidas sensed that the steward felt personally attacked. That would get him nowhere. Eukomos was a proud man, a man who had been a devoted servant of the Agiads all his working life. He had served the dying Anaxandridas and the immature Cleomenes, helped finance Dorieus, and husbanded Leonidas’ inheritance through the years of his immaturity. He had recommended Phormio to Leonidas when Leonidas came of age and needed someone to look after his affairs full time. Leonidas owed him a great deal, and he was a skilled administrator. He was a man to cultivate, not alienate. “Eukomos, you are to be highly commended for preserving the Agiad estate in such abundance despite my brother’s often irrational and extravagant tendencies.”
Eukomos gently let out his breath and smiled faintly, but he was still twisting the ring.
“I am deeply indebted to you for that―and for recommending Phormio.”
Eukomos nodded his thanks, but he was still on his guard after Leonidas’ startling opening attack.
“Please, sit down. Can we send for refreshments? I was standing all morning at Assembly and, I confess, I was too nervous to face breakfast.” Leonidas offered the last comment with a smile meant to disarm.
Eukomos jumped to his feet, mortified with embarrassment. “My lord! Why didn’t you say something sooner? I beg your forgiveness. At once!” He was gone before Leonidas could stop him, plunging out onto the long gallery and calling down in an imperative tone to someone below. Leonidas leaned forward to look more closely at the documents prepared for him.
The second papyrus showed income (in black ink) and outlays (in red). Most entries were quite understandable, but there were two enormous outlays that were unlabeled. As soon as Eukomos reentered, promising a tray of food and wine “in a moment or two,” Leonidas asked about these two entries.
Eukomos nodded. “Yes. They jump out at you, don’t they?” Leonidas wondered if Brotus would have noticed, but said nothing. “Officially, I don’t know what they were for. After all, your brother did not have to explain himself to me. The other outlays were paid by the household treasury with my approval, of course. Those two were payments directly to your brother at his insistence.”
“You said that ‘officially’ you did not know what they were. What about unofficially?”
“That,” the steward put his finger on the papyrus, “was drawn when your brother fled Lacedaemon, the sum he felt he needed to finance himself while he was away―and that,” he moved his finger up the page, “was to bribe the oracle at Delphi.”
Leonidas caught his breath to hear this sacrilege referred to so casually. But how else should the steward speak of it? It wasn’t a secret anymore. He nodded. “What else have you prepared for me?”
“This is the list of debtors and the sums owed. Whatever else one can say about your brother, he was not prone to lending. You can cancel these debts without a second thought.”
“Most of these men are foreigners,” Leonidas noted.
“Yes, that’s true,” Eukomos admitted without further comment.
“Why?”
Eukomos shrugged. “Your brother sometimes played with the notion of inviting foreign ‘friends’ to eliminate his domestic ‘enemies.’”
Leonidas caught his breath, then let it out and said no more. He let Eukomos turn to the next papyrus. “And this is the list of heiresses in your guardianship.”
“Heiresses?”
“Girls whose fathers died before they were betrothed. The kings act as surrogate fathers and must approve a marriage.”
“Jointly?” Leonidas asked, instantly alarmed.
Eukomos almost laughed. “No. That may have been the original practice, but it proved untenable long ago. Nowadays, heiresses are assigned
to one king or the other, based on a complicated formula.”
“And how many do I have to look after?” Leonidas sounded distinctly alarmed.
“Fourteen at the moment, none yet of marriageable age. The eldest is, I believe, thirteen. If I may make a suggestion, my lord, I think it would be best if you asked your wife to call on all the girls as soon as possible. Fatherless girls can be quite difficult sometimes.” Eukomos did not meet his eye as he said this, but then he risked a glance at Leonidas and suddenly they were both laughing. The ice was finally broken.
By the time the snack arrived, Eukomos and Leonidas were deep in a congenial conversation, but they were soon interrupted by one of the servants. He came to the door of the library and reported, “My lord, there is a young man outside demanding admittance. The meleirenes stopped him and he’s getting very loud.”
Leonidas looked at Eukomos, who shrugged and remarked, “I’m sure he’ll calm down when the watch arrests him.”
“I want no one arrested because they seek to speak to me.”
“Not everyone has pleasant things to say,” Eukomos noted dryly.
Leonidas laughed. “My brothers taught me that long ago. I’ll see who it is and what he wants. Then I’ll be back.”
From the front entry hall he could hear shouting coming from the street. He recognized the voice that was shouting insults at the meleirenes in a raw fury, calling them bastards and curs and sons of whores: it was Meander.
Leonidas thrust the doors open and stepped out onto the porch, making the meleirenes jump and look over in alarm. “What the hell do you think you are doing denying access to my attendant?” he demanded of the youths.
“But he’s a helot, sir! Helots―”
Meander roared in pain, “I’m no more a helot that you are, you bastards! I’m just as good as you are! I’ll―”
“That’s enough, Meander,” Leonidas told him sharply. “Stop making a scene. Come inside.”
Meander did not wait to be told twice, pausing only long enough to spit at one of the meleirenes in passing before darting inside the palace and asking Leonidas, “Did you hear what they said, sir?―I mean, my lord!”
The meleirene on duty protested, “We were only following orders, my lord. Helots have no right to enter the palace by this door. They have to go around to the stables or the kitchen.”
“Tell me, meleirene, did you never see Meander with me in the past?”
“Of course, sir―my lord―but that doesn’t change the fact that he’s a helot.”
“He may not be a Spartiate, but he is no helot!”
“I don’t understand, my lord.”
Leonidas resisted the temptation to admit he didn’t, either, and said instead, “I am king to helots as well as Spartiates and perioikoi, and I will see any man who comes in peace.” Then he closed the door behind him and growled at Meander, “I should have your hide for making a scene like that!”
“But, sir, I just found out you are king. I came―I mean―isn’t it my place to be with you?” Meander couldn’t decide if he should be belligerent, apologetic, or jubilant.
“Come with me,” Leonidas ordered, and started back for the library with a still confused Meander in his wake.
For almost a decade, Meander had served as Leonidas’ attendant, but he preferred to live in the lochos barracks, where the camaraderie among the attendants made him feel his loss of status less acutely. As he trailed in Leonidas’ wake through the ancient halls of the royal palace, he started feeling more and more intimidated. To serve the wealthy, respected officer Leonidas was an honor that helped compensate him for the fact that he would never be a citizen, but serving a king was very different. “Sir?”
Leonidas glanced over.
“If―if you are king, then you can’t be lochagos anymore, can you?”
Leonidas hadn’t thought that far himself yet, but it was true. He nodded.
“But then, we’ll―I’ll―have to move out of your quarters there ….”
“Yes … unless my successor wishes to hire you.”
“Who is your successor, sir?”
“It is too soon to know. I only became king a few hours ago. There’s no rush about moving out. Come up these stairs.”
When Leonidas re-entered the library, he was surprised to find that Eukomos was no longer alone; Phormio had joined him. Phormio broke into a broad smile and pulled his heavy body up at the sight of Leonidas. “Congratulations, my lord! Congratulations. You have no idea how delighted I was to hear the news! No idea! I hoped, of course, I did what I could to help things along, but who can predict what will come out of a Spartan Assembly? A pride of Spartiates is more unpredictable than the Gods themselves.”
Leonidas waved him to sit down again and checked the pitchers on the table. They were almost empty. “Meander, fetch us more water and wine,” Leonidas ordered, handing the vessels to his attendant.
“I don’t know my way around―”
“Then ask someone,” Leonidas ordered. “You’ll have to learn fast―if you want to remain in my service.”
“Yes, sir!”
Only after Meander was out of hearing did Leonidas himself sit down and announce, with a gesture in the direction of the door by which Meander had exited: “It’s because of young men like that that we, the three of us, need to consider a new land reform.”
“Zeus help us all!” Phormio exclaimed, only half in jest. “He’s been in power less than five hours and he’s already trying to compete with the reformer king, Polydorus.”
Leonidas ignored his own steward to focus on Eukomos. “That young man’s parents were both Spartiates and he attended the agoge until his fifteenth year, but then his father couldn’t afford the agoge fees anymore and yanked him out. At the next bad harvest, his father wasn’t able to afford his syssitia fees, either, and he hanged himself. We have barely eight thousand citizens. Corinth has twenty thousand, Athens thirty thousand, Thebes fifteen thousand. We Spartans can’t afford to lose men, and their sons, just because they can’t pay their syssitia fees. That is exactly what Lycurgus’ land reform was intended to prevent!”
“The figures you cited are misleading, my lord,” Eukomos remarked in a calming tone. “In other cities, whether in Athens or Corinth, citizens too poor to fight as hoplites are still counted among the citizen ranks. In Lacedaemon, in contrast, you don’t count even the perioikoi hoplites. If you compare Lacedaemon, including the perioikoi, to other cities, the imbalance is not significant.”
“Agreed,” Leonidas conceded. “But that doesn’t address the problem.”
“What problem?” Eukomos asked, confused.
“Inequitable distribution of wealth!” Leonidas replied impatiently.
“My lord! Wealth is never equitably distributed. It is always concentrated in the hands of the rulers and elites―from Persia and Babylon to Egypt and Macedonia. To my knowledge, Sparta is the only place on earth where anyone ever tried to redistribute it and where every citizen is at least entitled to an estate. But no one ever said that all citizens’ estates must be equal!”
“Of course the estates are supposed to be equal!” Leonidas countered. “That’s why we call ourselves ‘Peers’―equals. The land reform that made all citizens equal is the basis of our entire constitution. Furthermore, it was approved by Apollo himself. Regardless of how others live, we have a sacred duty to respect the Laws of Lycurgus―and those Laws entitle each legitimate son of Spartan parents to a landholding large enough to support him and his family. Instead of that, hundreds of citizens live on land that is marginal and are at risk of losing their citizenship. It is an intolerable situation―doubly so when I see that I, one man, must own almost 20 per cent of Lacedaemon!”
Eukomos looked at his new master as if he were sprouting a second head.
“I tried to tell you he was not your ordinary prince,” Phormio remarked, with a chuckle at the expression on Eukomos’ face.
“And while we’re on the subject of reforms,”
Leonidas continued, as the reality of his power started to sink into his consciousness, “we have to find a solution for the illegitimate offspring of Spartiate youth by helot girls. I watch Temenos’ boys growing up each day, and it tears me apart that they cannot follow in their father’s footsteps, that they will be denied an education and a chance to serve Lacedaemon.”
“There are many more ways to serve Lacedaemon, my lord, than in the Spartan phalanx,” Eukomos pointed out. “Every man has his place. Some are born to work the fields and others to tend the flocks, some to sit behind the spinning disk of the potter’s wheel, and others to hammer at the forge. Why, even heralds, flute players, and cooks are hereditary professions.”
“But that’s the point: Temenos is Spartiate. His sons should be, too.”
“Leonidas,” Phormio started in a warning voice, “if you start making every bastard child a citizen, there will be no reason for marriage anymore, and all your maidens will go husbandless to their graves.”
Leonidas laughed. “Take another look at our maidens, Phormio! But I didn’t mean every bastard, only those a man acknowledges and sponsors.”
“There are much more serious and pressing issues than this,” Phormio retorted, provoking raised eyebrows from Eukomos, who found the tone disrespectful. He glanced at Leonidas to see his reaction. Leonidas appeared more curious than offended. He asked back, “Such as?”
Meander returned with two large pitchers, and while the young man set about filling the cups on the table, Phormio began. “Seventy per cent of Lacedaemon’s population is made up of helots. Some of them live in conditions far worse than that of your marginalized citizens. Although the law says a helot has the right to retain 50 per cent of the yield of his labor, helots tend to have larger families, and their share often does not stretch far enough. Children put out to service earn almost nothing―particularly the girls in household service, who are frequently treated no better than chattel slaves. Some helots sell their children outright.”
A Heroic King Page 27