The forces of progressive politics in Sparta-to the extent that there were any in that most unusual of cities-came oddly enough from within the two royal families. It was the common Spartans who were the ultraconservatives. The reason for this is the one that Gorgo gives in the book: that a king knows his descendants will be ruling the city for hundreds of years to come, and therefore takes the long view. The common Spartan was very, very reactionary.
The political order was as the book gives: two hereditary lines of kings who ruled simultaneously, with a council of elders to advise them, and an elected council of ephors with power of veto.
The story of the krypteia ritual looks like something I must have made up, but it was for real. The krypteia was nothing short of training and field practice in the art of assassination. The ancient biographer Plutarch says this of the krypteia ritual, from his Life of Lycurgus:
The so-called KRYPTEIA … is as follows: The magistrates from time to time sent out into the countryside at large the most discreet of the young men, equipped only with daggers and necessary supplies. During the day they scattered into obscure and out-of-the-way places, where they hid themselves and lay quiet. But in the night, they came down to the roads and killed every helot whom they caught. Often, too, they actually made their way across fields where the helots were working and killed the sturdiest and best of them.
Aristotle has a word on the subject too. He says that the ephors, as soon as they came into office, made formal declaration of war upon their own helot slaves, so that there might be no impiety in slaying them.
What made war inevitable was the growth of Athenian power, and the fear which this caused in Sparta.
So said Thucydides in his great history of the Peloponnesian War, and in that one sentence he pretty much sums up why everything went so horribly wrong. If you studied ancient history at school then your stomach is probably churning at the sight of it, because it’s almost impossible to get through any ancient history course without writing a long essay about that sentence!
The Olympic Games of 460 BC was the first after Athens became a full democracy, and the last before the First Peloponnesian War began. Sacred Games plays out, in the microcosm of the Olympics, the hideously complex intercity politics unfolding across Greece. This book takes place almost exactly twenty years after the Persian Wars. In the face of the Persian onslaught, the Greeks had united for the first time (sort of … mostly … even then there were major arguments). But once the Persian War was over, it didn’t take long for the alliance to fracture.
The interweb of alliances and enmities between the Greek city-states was at least as complex as the diplomatic situation in Europe prior to World War I, and just as liable to explode. So when my fictitious Arakos the Spartan is murdered at Olympia, that could be all that was needed to send Greece into a general conflagration.
In the author’s note to The Pericles Commission, I described Athens as a deer caught between two wolves: Sparta and Persia. Now we’re up to book three, and it’s not getting any better for our heroes. Athens has started a war in Egypt; it’s a strategic diversion to force the Persians to send their army there rather than back into Europe. But it’s a huge commitment. If Sparta joins in, things are going to get tricky. Now it looks like Sparta wants to play.
Athens, a city of not more than 250,000 people, barely larger than a modern town, is prosecuting wars on three continents. And right now, they’re winning every one of them.
Nico and Diotima have had a busy year. Which is only fair because the Athenian year spanning 461 to 460 BC was one of the most momentous in human history. Things can get hectic when you’re inventing western civilization.
In The Pericles Commission, Nico and Diotima dealt with internal political threats to the new democracy. In The Ionia Sanction, they dealt with threats from Persia in the east. Now in Sacred Games they’ve seen off danger from Sparta in the west. I think they deserve a holiday.
They’re going home to be married. I’m sure nothing can go wrong there.
EVENTS AND WINNERS OF THE 460 BC OLYMPICS
Nico only gets to see three events, but of course while he’s busy investigating, there’s a real Olympic Games going on in the background. For what it’s worth, here are my notes on who won what at the real Olympics of 460 BC. I’ve included Nico’s efforts so you can see where he fits in. If you’ve read the author’s note, then you’ll know how dodgy the winner lists can be. It’s possible for a winner to be misplaced by sixteen or twenty years. In the great majority of cases we have no idea who won, but where there’s a likely winner, I’ve named him.
I find it hard to believe that every Olympics was run to the same strict timetable. There were a few scheduled items that had to be fixed in stone-such as the opening and closing ceremonies, and the sacrifice of the oxen on Day Three-but beyond that the Greeks probably didn’t care exactly when the events began and ended.
The judges were free to add extra competitions around the edges of the core events. We know for example that this Olympics was one of only fourteen to include a mule race. And of course at these Olympics they added the unique event of murder investigation.
Day 1 — Morning
The Olympic Oath
Competition for the Heralds
The boys’ events: running, wrestling and boxing
A lad by the name of Kyniskos won the boys’ boxing, which we know because a statue was made of him by the sculptor Polykleitos. The winner of the boys’ wrestling was a certain Alcimedon, who was praised by Pindar in a song now known as Olympian 8. (Which goes to show that Pindar was present at these Games, and that he managed to get some work!)
Day 1 — Afternoon
The afternoon of Day 1 was free time. Fathers looking to find husbands for their daughters would be checking out the prospects. Old friends from different cities would be catching up.
Day 2 — Morning
Nico and Markos take an extra special Olympic Oath.
Chariot Races
there were four:
2-horse chariot race for colts
2-horse chariot race for older horses
4-horse chariot race for colts
4-horse chariot race for older horses
For my own dramatic purposes I had the 4-horse race for older horses run first. Nico and Markos miss the other events.
Horse races
there were three:
Race for stallions
Race for colts
Race for mares
The mule race probably came after the horse races, no doubt for comic relief.
Day 2 — Afternoon
The Pentathlon:
Running
Wrestling
Long Jump
Discus
Javelin
Day 3 — Morning
The sacrifice of the oxen. This was the event of the Games for the ancient Greeks.
Day 3 — Afternoon
First up was the dolichos, which was the long distance race. The winner in 460 BC was the famous Ladas of Argos. He was known as a runner so very light on the ground that his feet never left an imprint. It’s said that he died on his way home from these Olympics, and that a memorial was built by the roadside where he collapsed.