Agesilaus partial solar eclipse November 5, 380 BCE (Revised date)

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Created 5941_[(_?_)]01 19 2027 [2011-05-23]

Last edited 5941_[(_?_)]01 20 2027 [2011-05-24]

Agelilaüs’s Partial Solar Eclipse

November 5, 380 BCE

Abstract:

Given my prior studies of Nicias’ lunar eclipse and the time relationships between the deaths of Nicias and Agesilaüs, as provided by Plutarch, the number of solar eclipses visible from the Greece horizon becomes very limited indeed. Adding to that Plutarch’s reference to the subsequent Olympic games, Agesilaüs’ partial solar eclipse can easily and almost certainly be dated to November 5, 380 BCE, which, as seen from the specified location in Greece had a maximum magnitude of 0.9, while placed comfortably in time five years after Nicias’ death and seven months prior to the next subsequent Olympic games in the summer of 379 BCE. No other likely contenders are found within a twelve year span following Nicias’ solar eclipse in 385 BCE.

Praise the Lord of Hosts, the Ancient of Days, for providing for us the only reliable time keepers, that is, those observable forever on the skies above our heads!

Click on the picture for an interactive map! Cf. this link!

This is the solar eclipse that I find being my most favored candidate for being Agesilaüs’s solar eclipse.

Considerations:

Quoting Plutarch, The Parallel Lives, The Life of Agesilaüs,

re relevant time references useful for determining the time of this eclipse:

6 Agesilaüs had but recently come to the throne, when tidings were brought from Asia that the Persian king was preparing a great armament with which to drive the Lacedaemonians from the sea. Now, Lysander was eager to be sent again into Asia, and to aid his friends there. These he had left governors and masters of the cities, but owing to their unjust and violent conduct of affairs, they were being driven out by the citizens, and even put to death. He therefore persuaded Agesilaüs to undertake the expedition and make war in behalf of Hellas, proceeding to the farthest point across the sea, and thus anticipating the preparations of the Barbarian. 2 At the same time he wrote to his friends in Asia urging them to send messengers to Sparta and demand Agesilaüs as their commander. Accordingly, Agesilaüs went before the assembly of the people and agreed to undertake the war if they would grant him thirty Spartans as captains and counsellors, a select corps of two thousand enfranchised Helots, and a force of allies amounting to six thousand. 3 They readily voted everything, owing to the co-operation of Lysander, and sent Agesilaüs forth at once with the thirty Spartans. Of these Lysander was first and foremost, not only because of his own reputation and influence, but also because of the friendship of Agesilaüs, in whose eyes his procuring him this command was a greater boon than his raising him to the throne.

9 At first Tisaphernesº was afraid of Agesilaüs, and made a treaty in which he promised him to make the Greek cities free and independent of the King. Afterwards, however, when he was convinced that he had a sufficient force, he declared war, and Agesilaüs gladly accepted it….

10 When the season again favoured an incursion into the enemy's country,[1] Agesilaüs gave out that he would march into Lydia, and this time he was not trying to deceive Tisaphernes. That satrap, however, utterly deluded himself, in that he disbelieved Agesilaüs because of his former trick, and thought that now, at any rate, the king would attack Caria, 601although it was ill-suited for cavalry, and he was far inferior in that arm of the service. 2 But Agesilaüs, as he had given out that he would do, marched into the plain of Sardis, and then Tisaphernes was forced to hasten thither from Caria with aid and relief; and riding through the plain with his cavalry, he cut off many straggling plunderers there. Agesilaüs, accordingly, reflecting that the enemy's infantry had not yet come up, while his own forces were complete, made haste to give battle. 3 He mingled his light-armed infantry with his horsemen, and ordered them to charge at full speed and assault the enemy, while he himself at once led up his men-at‑arms. The Barbarians were put to flight, and the Greeks, following close upon them, took their camp and slew many of them. As a result of this battle, the Greeks could not only harry the country of the King without fear, but had the satisfaction of seeing due punishment inflicted upon Tisaphernes, an abominable man, and most hateful to the Greek race. 4 For the King at once sent Tithraustes after him, who cut off his head, and asked Agesilaüs to make terms and sail back home, offering him money at the hands of his envoys. But Agesilaüs answered that it was for his city to make peace, and that for his own part, he took more pleasure in enriching his soldiers than in getting rich himself; moreover, the Greeks, he said, thought it honourable to take, not gifts, but spoils, from their enemies. 5 Nevertheless, desiring to gratify Tithraustes, because he had punished Tisaphernes, that common enemy of the Greeks, he led his army back into Phrygia, taking thirty talents from the viceroy to cover the expenses of the march.

13… 4 At any rate, there is in circulation a letter of his to Hidrieus the Carian, which runs as follows: "As for Nicias, if he is innocent, acquit him; if he is guilty, acquit him for my sake; but in any case acquit him."…

14 Agesilaüs had now been nearly two years in the field…

15 Asia being now unsettled and in many quarters inclined to revolt, Agesilaüs set the cities there in order, and restored to their governments, without killing or banishing any one, the proper form. Then he determined to go farther afield, to transfer the war from the Greek sea, to fight for the person of the King and the wealth of Ecbatana and Susa, and above all things to rob that monarch of the power to sit at leisure on his throne, playing the umpire for the Greeks in their wars, and corrupting their popular leaders.

17 Here Diphridas, an ephor from Sparta, met him, with orders to invade Boeotia immediately. Therefore, although he was purposing to do this later with a larger armament, he thought it did not behoove him to disobey the magistrates, but said to those who were with him that the day was near for which they had come from Asia. He also sent for two divisions of the army at Corinth. 2 Then the Lacedaemonians at home, wishing to do him honour, made proclamation that any young man who wished might enlist in aid of the king. All enlisted eagerly, and the magistrates chose out the most mature and vigorous of them to the number of fifty, and sent them off.

Agesilaüs now marched through the pass of Thermopylae, traversed Phocis, which was friendly to Sparta, entered Boeotia, and encamped near Chaeroneia. Here a partial eclipse of the sun occurred, and at the same time news came to him of the death of Peisander, who was defeated in a naval battle off Cnidus by Pharnabazus and Conon. 3 Agesilaüs was naturally much distressed at these tidings, both because of the man thus lost, and of the city which had lost him; but nevertheless, that his soldiers might not be visited with dejection and fear as they were going into battle, he ordered the messengers from the sea to reverse their tidings and say that the Spartans were victorious in the naval battle. He himself also came forth publicly with a garland on his head, offered sacrifices for glad tidings, and sent portions of the sacrificial victims to his friends.…

19… 3 And when the enemy sent to him and asked permission to take up their dead, he made a truce with them, and having thus assured to himself the victory, proceeded to Delphi, where the Pythian games were in progress. There he celebrated the customary procession in honour of the god, and offered up the tenth of the spoils which he had brought from Asia, amounting to a hundred talents.

20 However, on seeing that some of the citizens esteemed themselves highly and were greatly lifted up because they bred racing horses, he persuaded his sister Cynisca to enter a chariot in the contests at Olympia, wishing to shew the Greeks that the victory there was not a mark of any great excellence, but simply of wealth and lavish outlay.

21 Having thus obtained very great influence in the city, he effected the appointment of Teleutias, his half-brother on his mother's side, as admiral. Then he led an army to Corinth, and himself, by land, captured the long walls, while Teleutias, with his fleet, seized the enemy's ships and dockyards. Then coming suddenly upon the Argives who at that time held Corinth, and were celebrating the Isthmian games, he drove them away just as they had sacrificed to the god, and made them abandon all their equipment for the festival…

(Plutarch, Parallel Lives, The Life of Agesilaüs, Vol V:17)

Based upon the above I recognize Tisaphernes from my prior studies of Nicias’ time as related by Thucydides at the tail end of his History of the Peloponnesian War. I notice that Tisaphernes was still alive after Nicias’ death in the 19^th year of the Peloponnesian War, which year was the year of Nicias’ lunar eclipse on August 18, 385 BCE. Furthermore, I recognize that Tisaphernes was beheaded by Agesilaüs within the two years referenced in Chapter 14 above, which years ended prior to Agesilaüs’ partial solar eclipse, and that said solar eclipse took place prior to what appears to be the next subsequent Olympic games (cf. my table at this link!) It follows that Agasilaus’ partial solar eclipse must have taken place within a very few years following Nicias’ lunar eclipse on August 18, 385:

Legend:		Comprehensive listing of all (Finding in the NASA’s Five Millennium Canon of Solar Eclipses only one good fit among 5 eclipses at all visible from Greece; cf. first column, items #1-5!) Solar Eclipses Possibly Visible from Chaeroneia in Boeotia near Thebes from 385 BCE (Nicias’s eclipse) through 373 BCE									Legend:
Not likely											Not likely
Possible											Possible
Good fit											Good fit
#	Dated eclipse		Year (BCE)	Type	Local appearance of eclipse as observed from Chaeroneia in Boeotia	Maximum eclipse - UT at the location within the Roman Empire which was closest to noon time	Maximum eclipse - Local solar time at the location within the Roman Empire which was closest to noon time	Sunset or sunrise - SNB local solar time at the location within the Roman Empire which was closest to noon time	Time relation relative to the next Olympic Games	Assessment
1	July 13		383	Hybrid	Partial (0.134)	12:08:15	13:38		A few days or else 4 years
2	Nov 5		380	Hybrid	Partial (0.9)	06:31:27	08:01		7 months	This eclipse is almost certainly Agesilaüs’ partial solar eclipse.
3	May 2		379	Annular	Partial (0.399)	07:48:12	09:18		2 months	A partial eclipse of 0.4 magnitude is not likely to be noticed.
4	April 21		378	Partial (0.8424)	Partial (0.1)				3 years
5	September 4		377	Annular	Partial (0.586)	14:06:32	15:36		2 years	This is the only possible contender, albeit quite unlikely (too late and too low magnitude to be noticed.)

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[1] Original footnote: “In the spring of 395 B.C.; cf. Xenophon, Hell. III.4.16 ff.”