Themistocles

then, neither embittered by anything like anger against his former fellow-citizens, nor lifted up by the great honor and power he was to have in the war, but possibly thinking his task not even approachable, both because Hellas had other great generals at the time, and especially because Cimon was so marvelously successful in his campaigns; yet most of all out of regard for the reputation of his own achievements and the trophies of those early days; having decided that his best course was to put a fitting end to his life,

he made a sacrifice to the gods, then called his friends together, gave them a farewell clasp of his hand, and, as the current story goes, drank bull’s blood, or as some say, took a quick poison, and so died in Magnesia, in the sixty-fifth year of his life,[*](Thuc. 1.138) most of which had been spent in political leadership. They say that the King, on learning the cause and the manner of his death, admired the man yet more, and continued to treat his friends and kindred with kindness.

Themistocles left three sons by Archippe, the daughter of Lysander, of the deme Alopece, namely: Archeptolis, Polyeuctus and Cleophantus, the last of whom Plato the philosopher mentions as a capital horseman, but good for nothing else.[*](Plat. Meno 93) One of his two oldest sons, Neocles, died in boyhood from the bite of a horse, and Diocles was adopted by his grandfather Lysander.