Читать книгу The Herodotus Encyclopedia - Группа авторов - Страница 262

BRIAN M. LAVELLE

Loyola University Chicago

Alcmaeon, son of MEGACLES (I), lived around 600 BCE and was eponymous for the Athenian clan of the ALCMAEONIDAE. Herodotus (6.125) tells how Alcmaeon assisted Lydian envoys at DELPHI while in EXILE from ATHENS for his clan’s part in the Cylonian affair. CROESUS king of LYDIA rewarded him at SARDIS with as much GOLD dust as he could carry from the treasury. Alcmaeon filled his clothes, boots, HAIR, and mouth; when Croesus amusedly observed him staggering from the treasury, he allowed him to take again as much. The story is folktale—Croesus ruled in the mid‐sixth century—but accounts for the wealth that permitted Alcmaeon to field a victorious CHARIOT‐team at OLYMPIA in 592 and that likely purchased his return to Athens. If Alcmaeon served as Athenian general during the First Sacred War (Plut. Sol. 11.2), reinstatement likely occurred before 590; the prestige of his Olympic victory may have helped to pave his way back to Athens. Alcmaeon’s son MEGACLES (II) was an important political figure in mid‐sixth‐century Athens (1.59.3).

SEE ALSO: Athletes and Athletic Games; Chronology; Cylon; Laughter; Wealth and Poverty