128 Suburban gardens. Farm-work and soldiering 



Greek life, and the growth of cities did not make it less popular. The 

 land immediately beyond the city walls was often laid out in this 

 manner. When Aratus in 251 BC took Sicyon and attached it to the 

 Achaean League, the surprise was effected by way of a suburban 1 

 garden. And we have no reason to suppose that holdings near a city 

 lacked cultivators. Even in the horrible period of confusion and blood- 

 shed at Syracuse, from the death of Dionysius the elder to the victory 

 of Timoleon, we hear 2 of Syracusans living in the country, and of the 

 usual clamour for redistribution of lands. In the endeavour to repopu- 

 late the city an invitation to settlers was issued, with offer 3 of land- 

 allotments, and apparently the promise was kept. These notices suggest 

 that there was a demand for surburban holdings, but tell us nothing 

 as to the state of things in the districts further afield, or as to the class 

 of labour employed on the land. In any case Syracuse was a sea-port, 

 and accustomed to get a good part of its supplies by sea. Very dif- 

 ferent was the situation in Peloponnesus, where the up-country towns 

 had to depend chiefly on the produce of their own territories. There 

 land-hunger was ever present. The estates of men driven out in civil 

 broils were seized by the victorious party, and restoration of exiles at 

 once led to a fresh conflict over claims to restitution of estates. One of 

 the most difficult problems 4 with which Aratus had to deal at Sicyon 

 was this ; and in the end he only solved it by the use of a large sum 

 of money, the gift of Ptolemy Philadelphus. The restored exiles on 

 this occasion are said to have been not less than 580 in all. They had 

 been expelled by tyrants who had in recent years ruled the city, and 

 whose policy it had evidently been to drive out the men of property 

 sworn foes of tyrants and to reward their own adherents out of con- 

 fiscated lands. To reverse this policy was the lifelong aim of Aratus. 

 In the generation following, the life of his successor Philopoemen gives 

 us a little light on agriculture from another point of view, that of the 

 soldier. He was resolved to make the army of the Achaean League an 

 efficient force. As a young man he concluded 5 that the Greek athletic 

 training was not consistent with military life, in which the endurance 

 of hardship and ability to subsist on any diet were primary necessities. 

 Therefore he devoted his spare time to agriculture, working 6 in person 

 on his farm, about 2j miles from Megalopolis, sharing the labour and 

 habits of the labourers (epyarwv). The use of the neutral word leaves 

 a doubt as to whether freemen or slaves are meant : taken in connexion 

 with the passages cited from Polybius, it is perhaps more likely that 

 the reference is to slaves. But the chief interest of the story as pre- 



1 Plutarch Aratus 5-8. 2 pi ut 



3 Plut Timoleon 23, 36. * Plut Aratus 9, 12, 14. 



5 Plut Philopoemen 3, 4. In fact became an aurovpyos. 



