Tusculan Disputations

Thectamenes, when the Ephors condemned him to death, went away smiling. Someone among the bystanders asked him if he felt such contempt for the laws of Sparta. No, said he, but I rejoice to think that I must pay this penalty myself without begging or borrowing anything from anybody. Cf. Cicero, Tusculan Disputations, i. 42 (100).

HIPPODAMUS The attempt has been made to identify Hippodamus with the Hippodamus mentioned in Athenaeus, 452 A and in Polyaenus, Strategemata, ii. 15, and, by emendation, to reconcile this passage with the time of Agis IV.; but both Agis II. and Agis III. had fathers named Archidamus, and it is quite possible that the incident of sending away from danger the old man and the young heir to the throne took place as here narrated.

Hippodamus, when Agis was taking his place on the field of battle beside Archidamus, was sent with Agis to Sparta to render his services there. But look you, said he, I shall meet no more honourable death than in playing the part of a brave man for Sparta’s sake. (He was over eighty years old.) And thereupon, seizing his arms and taking his stand at the king’s right hand, he fell fighting.