Pausanias
（
Παυσανίας).
1.
A Spartan of the Agid branch of the royal family, the son of Cleombrotus and nephew of
Leonidas. Several writers incorrectly call him king; but he only succeeded his father
Cleombrotus in the guardianship of his cousin Plistarchus, the son of Leonidas, for whom he
exercised the functions of royalty from B.C. 479 to the period of his death. In 479, when the
Athenians called upon the Lacedaemonians for aid against the Persians, the Spartans sent a
body of 5000 Spartans, each attended by seven Helots, under the command of Pausanias. At the
Isthmus, Pausanias was joined by the other Peloponnesian allies, and at Eleusis by the
Athenians when he took command of the united armies, the other Greek generals forming his
council. The allied forces numbered 110,000 men. Near Plataeae in Boeotia Pausanias defeated
the Persians under Mardonius and thus assured the independence of Greece.
For his own reward, Pausanias received one tenth of the spoils (
Herod.ix.
10-85;
Diod.xi. 29-33).
In the year 477 the Greeks sent out a fleet under Pausanias to drive the Persians from the
islands. He attacked Cyprus and subdued the greater part, and then sailed to Byzantium, which
he succeeded in taking. After this victory Pausanias began to aim at personal dominion for
himself rather than success for his country, being evidently dazzled by his unbroken and
brilliant successes. His ambition seems to have looked for a tyranny over the whole of
Greece, and to have conceived the plan of securing the aid of the Persian king in the
accomplishment of this design. Among the prisoners taken at Byzantium were some Persians
connected with the royal family. These he sent to the king, with a letter, in which he
offered to bring Sparta and the rest of Greece under his power, and proposed to marry his
daughter. His offers were gladly accepted, and whatever amount of troops and money he
required for accomplishing his designs. Pausanias now set no bounds to his arrogant and
domineering temper. The allies were so disgusted by his conduct that they all, except the
Peloponnesians and Aeginetans, voluntarily offered to transfer to the Athenians that
pre-eminence of rank which Sparta had hitherto enjoyed. In this way the Athenian confederacy
first took its rise. Reports of the conduct and designs of Pausanias reached Sparta, and he
was recalled and put upon his trial; but the evidence respecting his meditated treachery was
not yet thought sufficiently strong. Shortly afterwards he returned to Byzantium, without the
orders of the ephors, and renewed his treasonable intrigues. He was again recalled to Sparta,
was again put on his trial, and again acquitted. But even after this second escape he still
continued to carry on his intrigues with Persia. At length a man, who was charged with a
letter to Persia, having his suspicions awakened by noticing that none of those sent
previously on similar errands had returned, counterfeited the seal of Pausanias and opened
the letter, in which he found directions for his own death. He carried the letter to the
ephors, who prepared to arrest Pausanias; but he took refuge in the temple of
Athené Chalcioecus. The ephors stripped off the roof of the temple and built up
the door; the aged mother of Pausanias is said to have been among the first who laid a stone
for this purpose. When he was on the point of expiring, the ephors took him out lest his
death should pollute the sanctuary. He died as soon as he got outside, B.C. 470. He left
three sons behind him, Plistoanax, afterwards king, Cleomenes, and Aristocles. See Bulwer's
unfinished novel,
Pausanias the Spartan.
2.
Son of Plistoanax, and grandson of the preceding, was king of Sparta from B.C. 408 to 394.
In 403 he was sent with an army into Attica, and secretly favoured the cause of Thrasybulus
and the Athenian exiles, in order to counteract the plans of Lysander. In 395 Pausanias was
sent with an army against the Thebans; but in consequence of the death of Lysander, who was
slain under the walls of Haliartus, on the day before Pausanias reached the spot, the king
agreed to withdraw his forces from Boeotia. On his return to Sparta he was impeached, and
seeing that a fair trial was not to be hoped for, went into voluntary exile, and was
condemned to death. He was living at Tegea in 385, when Mantinea was besieged by his
son Agesipolis, who succeeded him on the throne.
3.
King of Macedonia, the son and successor of Aeropus. He was assassinated in the year of his
accession by Amyntas II., 394.
4.
A pretender to the throne of Macedonia, made his appearance in 367, after Alexander II. had
been assassinated by Ptolemaeus. Eurydicé, the mother of Alexander, sent to
request the aid of the Athenian general, Iphicrates, who expelled Pausanias from the
kingdom.
5.
A Macedonian youth of distinguished family, from the province of Orestis. Having been
shamefully treated by Attalus, he complained of the outrage to Philip; but as Philip took no
notice of his complaints, he directed his vengeance against the king himself. He shortly
afterwards murdered Philip at the festival held at Aegae, 336, but was slain on the spot by
some officers of the king's guard. Suspicion rested on Olympias and Alexander of having been
privy to the deed; but with regard to Alexander, at any rate, the suspicion is probably
totally unfounded. There is a story that Pausanias, while meditating revenge, having asked
the sophist Hermocrates which was the shortest way to fame, the latter replied, that it was
by killing the man who had performed the greatest achievements.
6.
A celebrated Greek traveller and geographer, a native of Lydia. He explored Greece,
Macedonia, Asia, and Africa; and then, in the second half of the second century A.D., settled
in Rome, where he composed a
Periegesis (
Περιήγησις) or Itinerary of Greece in ten books. Book I. includes Attica and
Megaris; II., Corinth with Sicyon, Phlius, Argolis, Aegina, and the other neighbouring
islands; III., Laconia; IV., Messenia; V., VI., Elis and Olympia; VII., Achaea; VIII.,
Arcadia; IX., Boeotia; X. , Phocis and Locris. The work is founded on notes, taken on the
spot, from his own observation and inquiry from the natives of the country, on the subject of
the religious cults and the monuments of art and architecture. Together with these there are
topographical and historical notices, in working up which Pausanias took into consideration
the accounts of other authors, especially of Polemon (A.D. 150), poets as well as prose
writers. Although his account is not without numerous inaccuracies, omissions, and mistakes,
it is yet of inestimable value for our knowledge of ancient Greece, especially with regard to
its mythology, folk-lore, and religious cults, but above all for the history of Greek art.
The composition of his work, especially in the earlier books, shows little skill in plan,
execution, or style, and, while accurate, shows that he did not grasp the distinction between
legend and history.
The best editions of Pausanias are those of Siebelis, 5 vols.
(Leipzig,
1822-28); and Schubart and Walz, 3 vols.
(1838-40; reprint by Teubner, Leipzig,
1862 and 1881). English translations by Taylor
(1793-94); Shilleto
(2 vols. 1886). See Kalkmann,
Pausanias der Perieget
(Berlin, 1886); Gurlitt,
Pausanias (Gratz, 1890); and
Miss
Verrall's Mythology and Monuments of Ancient Athens (1890).
