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Greece &

Rome,
Vol.
47,
No.
2,
October 2000
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE:
HELLENISM,
GREEK
LIBERATION,
AND THE
BATTLE OF THERMOPYLAE*
By
IAN MACGREGOR MORRIS
In the
eighteenth century,
attitudes towards ancient Greece were
changing
from an
antiquarian
interest in literature and
art,
into a
wider emotional affiliation that
permeated many aspects
of artistic and
political
life. With this new attitude came an interest in
contemporary
Greece and an awareness of and concern about her state under Turkish
rule
which, by
the
early
nineteenth
century,
culminated in
growing
sympathy
for the cause of Greek liberation. Of all the characters and
incidents of ancient Greek
history,
none
played
such a central
part
in
this tradition as those involved in the Battle of
Thermopylae
of 480
B.C.,
so that
by
the
very
eve of the Greek revolution in 1821
Byron
could call on his
contemporaries
to 'make a new
Thermopylae'.
The
history
of
Thermopylae
in the late
eighteenth
and
early
nineteenth
centuries
is,
in
many ways,
the
history
of
contemporary
hellenism.
The
story
of the
eighteenth-century
obsession with
Thermopylae
begins
in earnest in 1737. Richard
Glover,
at the
age
of
25, published
Leonidas,
a blank verse
epic poem
in nine
books,
some
5,000
lines
long.
Modern critics have been less than kind to
Glover, usually dismissing
his
work without reason or evidence.1 Yet in the
eighteenth century
the
reaction was
quite
different. The
poem
was 'for a short time the most
popular poem
in the
English language,'2
and its
popularity encouraged
Glover to
publish
an extended version in 1770 and to write a
sequel
published posthumously
in 1787. It went
through
three editions in the
first
year,
was translated into
French,
into German four
times,
and into
Danish;
eminent artists illustrated scenes from
it,
and it was twice
adapted
for the
stage.3
Glover himself became the toast of
literary
circles:
Swift,
in a letter to
Pope
-
a close
acquaintance
of Glover
-
wrote that Leonidas 'hath
great vogue';4 Joseph
Warton and
John
Scott
praised
it for its classical
'simplicity',
and Robert
Southey
for its
'classical
propriety', claiming
that he read it more than
any
other
poem,
and did so
'always
with renewed
pleasure'.5 Henry Fielding
described Glover as 'a celebrated
poet
of our
nation',6
and
Byron
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
included him in a list of
poet-orators
of whom he wrote: 'These are
great
names,
I
may imitate,
I can never
equal
them'.7
The
poem
is a
retelling
of the events before and
during
the battle of
Thermopylae.
Glover
closely
follows his historical sources -
mainly
Herodotus, Diodorus,
and Plutarch -
adding
embellishments
only
where
they
allow.8
Although
modern critics have accused him of
writing
the
poem
on behalf of a
political
faction
opposed
to Robert
Walpole's
ministry,9 any objective reading
of the
poem
refutes such a claim.
Although
there are
political
elements to the
poem, they
are
implicitly
critical of the
partisan politics
of the time and remain
secondary
to
artistic concerns. Glover's
objective
was to
compose
a
poem
on the
Homeric
model,
and his direct
rejection
of
many
of the norms of neo-
classical
epic theory
- as
epitomized by Dryden
and even
Pope
-
place
him in the forefront of the new
literary
trends that came to fruition in the
romanticism of the
early
nineteenth
century.
He lies somewhere in
between neo-classicism and
romanticism,
and while
describing
him as
a Romantic would be
going
too
far,
to describe him as a hellenist
would not.
Glover's hellenism can be seen in two
ways,
the first
literary,
and the
second
political. Firstly,
he avoids what
many
at the time saw as the
over-sophistication
and
artificiality
of modern
poetry,
in favour of
'simplicity',
an
ambiguous term,
but one often
favourably applied
to
Glover. Critics such as
Joseph
Warton and William
Cowper
considered
'simplicity'
as the
very
essence of ancient Greek
poetry, especially
Homer.
Contemporaries
saw in Glover's
poetry
a conscious emulation
of
Homer,
an
attempt
to return to ancient models of
poetry.?1
In the
seventeenth
century, during
the
height
of the
literary genre
that would
later be termed
'neo-classicism',
writers such as Milton and
Dryden,
while
greatly admiring
ancient literature had tended to believe that their
Christian
age
could
improve upon
it."
However,
one of the central
tenets of the hellenism of the
eighteenth century
was the belief
that,
despite
the
great
literature of the
Augustan age,
no such
improvement
had been made. As
such,
imitation was a virtue.
Secondly,
there is
Glover's attitude to the Greeks themselves. Glover was
among
a
growing group
of writers who were
turning
from Roman to Greek
models,
not
just
in
literary,
but also in moral terms. In
Leonidas,
the
characters
-
both Greek and Persian
-
epitomize varying
ideals and
aspects
of virtue. Glover is not so
simplistic
as to create
perfect
exemplars
in his
characters,
a
quality Dryden
had
thought
essential
for an
epic
hero.'2 Rather,
he uses the characters to elucidate the ideas
212
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
which ancient Greece was
increasingly being
seen to
represent.
For
example,
Leonidas' address to the
Spartan assembly:
Why
this astonishment on
ev'ry face,
Ye men of
Sparta?
Does the name of death
Create this fear and wonder?
O
my
friends!
Why
do we labour
through
the arduous
paths,
Which lead to virtue? Fruitless were the
toil,
Above the reach of human feet were
plac'd
The distant
summit,
if the fear of death
Could
intercept
our
passage.
But in vain
His blackest frowns and terrours he assumes
To shake the firmness of the
mind,
which
knows,
That
wanting
virtue life is
pain
and
woe,
That
wanting liberty
ev'n virtue
mourns,
And looks around for
happiness
in vain.
(Leonidas I.126-38)
Liberty
and virtue: two
concepts inextricably
linked and
seen, by many,
to be embodied in their
purest
form in ancient Greece. The
placing
of
these ideals in ancient Greece was the real
beginning
of hellenism. In
Glover there was an attitude of admiration to the ancient Greeks that
was
primarily
concerned with the
people
themselves. Before the
eight-
eenth
century,
while there had been much admiration for the artistic
achievements of ancient
Greece,
the
people
of ancient Greece them-
selves were viewed with a
general suspicion.13
As
such,
the concentra-
tion on the
people
rather than their art was
something
new.
James
Thomson,
in both The Seasons
(1726-44)
and
Liberty (1735)
had shown
elements of
this,
but in both of these works the Greeks were not
portrayed
as an
exceptional people,
but
merely
as
worthy
of
comparison
with Romans and Britons. While Glover never
actually
claimed the
ancient Greeks were
exceptional,
within his concentration on a Greek
story
and Greek virtue
lay
the seeds of such an idea.
Furthermore,
while Thomson's
Liberty,
or Mark Akenside's Pleasures
of
The
Imagination (1742)
both
placed eighteenth-century
ideals in
Ancient
Greece,
Glover took this one
step
further. His
poem
associated
these ideals with one
specific
event and
group
of
characters,
and the
success of Leonidas ensured this association in the
popular imagination.
Such an association was not
completely
new: the ideals of
liberty, virtue,
and
patriotism
can be found in connection with
Thermopylae
in
Simonides and
Herodotus, throughout antiquity,
and in mediaeval
and renaissance accounts.
However,
the success of this
poem
meant
that
Thermopylae
was
increasingly
identified as the
exemplar
of these
213
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
ideals. In the
1720s, James
Thomson had made no mention of Leonidas
among
his list of Greek 'worthies' in The
Seasons,
but in the final revised
edition of the
poem, published
in
1744,
the
Spartan
stands as the best
example
of
Lycurgan schooling.
In the wake of Leonidas,
Thermopylae
had become an essential
archetype.
* * *
In the
mid-eighteenth century,
travel to Greece
itself, though
still not
part
of the Grand
Tour,
was
gradualiy becoming
more common. These
travellers varied in
intent, ranging
from trade and
botany
to the
study
of
antiquities,
but
they
all contributed to an awareness of
Greece,
not
merely
as the scene and
origin
of classical
literature,
but as an actual
place.
Travellers' accounts of this
seemingly
exotic land were fuelled
by,
and in turn further
fuelled,
the
growing passion
for hellenism.
Although
the
primary
interest of
many
of these earlier travellers
lay
in the remains
of ancient
art, by
the 1750s a new
aspect
was
beginning
to
emerge.
Robert Wood's The Ruins
of Palmyra, published
in
1753,
is a
painstak-
ingly
illustrated record of that ancient
city.
However a
passage
in the
preface
shows that Wood's interests
lay beyond archaeology:
It is
impossible
to consider with indifference those countries which
gave
birth to letters
and
arts,
where
soldiers, orators, philosophers, poets
and artists have shewn the boldest
and
happiest flights
of
genius,
and done the
greatest
honour to human nature.
Circumstances of climate and
situation,
otherwise
trivial,
became
interesting
from that
connection with
great men,
and
great actions,
which
history
and
poetry
have
given
them:
the life of Miltiades or Leonidas could never be read with so much
pleasure,
as on the
plains
of Marathon or at the
streights
of
Thermopylae;
the Iliad has new beauties on the
banks of the
Scamander,
and the
Odyssey
is most
pleasing
in the countries where
Ulysses
travelled and Homer
sung.
The
particular pleasure,
it is
true,
which an
imagination
warmed on the
spot
receives from those scenes of heroick
actions,
the
traveller can
only feel,
nor is it to be communicated
by description.
But classical
ground
not
only
makes us
always
relish the
poet,
or historian
more,
but sometimes
helps
us to
understand them better.
Wood
was, along
with
James Stuart, among
the first
English
travellers to
visit
Thermopylae.
His fascination with the
landscape
is the
beginning
of a trend that was to reach its climax with the Romantic
poets.
The
Greek
landscape,
for
Wood, represents
a
continuity
with
antiquity,
that
is in some
ways
more
powerful
than the ruins. In his later work on
Homer,14
Wood used the
geography
of
Troy
to
explicate
the
Iliad,
and
much as modern classicists
may
scorn his
method,
his
contemporaries
did not. There arose a
belief,
fostered
by
the likes of Winckelmann and
Goethe,
in the
importance
of
visiting
the
setting
of ancient literature if it
214
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
was to be
fully appreciated,
and with this new attitude came an
inevitable concentration on the
subject-matter
of the
literature,
rather
than
simply
on the literature itself.
Moreover,
Wood's choice of ex-
amples
-
Troy, Marathon, Thermopylae
-
places
the
emphasis
on
actions rather than art:
Troy,
in this
case,
was
important
not
merely
as the
setting
of Homer's
poem,
but also as the site of a
great
historical -
as far as Wood was concerned - event. Later
writers, especially
those
concerned with
Thermopylae,
turned more and more to the land itself
for simile and
allegory.
Robert
Collvil, writing
in
1771,
defined heroism
as
being
like
'Sparta
o'er the Malian
bay'; John
Scott in 1782 visualized
how
'epic's
voice sonorous calls to Oeta's
cliffs';
and eleven
years
later
Henry Boyd
called on his readers to: 'Reflect on
Sparta,
and revere those
rites,
and that far celebrated soil,
Which bred
Leonidas.'l5
In each case it
was the natural
imagery
-
Sparta hanging
over the
bay,
the cliffs of
Oeta,
the soil of
Sparta
- that lent
power
and
meaning
to the
piece.
This
growing emphasis
on the relevance of and reaction to location
and
landscape
can be
clearly
seen in a contrast of two traveller's
accounts written some
sixty years apart.
Richard Pococke visited
Thermopylae
in about 1740 and relates the event in
simple
terms:
Our road was between the sea and
high
mountains; these mountains are called
Coumaita,
and are doubtless the old mount
Oeta,
so that I
began
to look for the
famous
passage
called
Thermopylae,
where the
Spartans
with a few men
opposed
the
great army
of the Persians.16
On
finding
the
change
in the
landscape,17
he is
equally passionless:
. . . The sea must have
lost,
and left the
passage wider, though possibly
it was a
way
round the
cape by
the sea
side,
where there
might
be some narrow
passes.
Edward Dodwell's account of his visit to the Pass in 1805 is
quite
different:
As we
approached
the Pass of
Thermopylae,
the
scenery
assumed at once an
aspect
of
more
beauty
and
sublimity.
To our left were the
lofty
and shattered
precipices
of
Oeta,
covered with
forests,
while silver lines of
descending springs sparkled
in the shade ... The
scene was one of
voluptuous
blandishments. No
gratification
was
wanting
which the
enraptured
lover of
landscape
could desire ... We now
approached
the
spot
where the
best blood of
Greece,
and of other
nations,
had so often been
spilt.'1
And his reaction to the
change
in the
landscape:
... The whole
country
has since
experienced great physical
as well as moral revolutions.
The sea has retired; rivers have altered their
courses,
and
towns, castles,
and
temples
215
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
have been
swept
from the face of the
earth,
or
ingulfed
in
marshes,
and
overgrown
with
weeds and bushes.
Here a moral element
emerged,
the
change
in the
landscape reflecting
the
degeneration
of Greece: the
very
land itself is affected
by
the
general
malaise. Pococke's reaction was one of
reporting
his observations with
an
objective accuracy,
while Dodwell's was a
passionate hymn
to the
location of a
great
event. Pococke was both interested and curious about
the event that took
place here,
but it was
only
the interest of an
antiquarian.
His failure to see the
pass
as he had visualized it
brings
only
the
question
as to whether the
geography
had indeed
changed,
and
the
comment,
without
any
sense of
disappointment,
that he
might
have
been in the
wrong place. However,
Dodwell
presented
a
sharp change
in
emphasis.
The
beauty
of the
location,
itself a testament to
nature,
also
served as a simile to the momentous events that took
place
there.
Moreover,
the
change
in that
landscape
was both
representative
of,
and indeed
part of,
the moral
change
that had
swept
Greece. Not
only
have the monuments fallen into ruin and the
people
themselves into a
moral
degradation
but,
in this location so
synonymous
with
liberty,
even
the
very
land itself had
metamorphosed.
Dodwell was an
accomplished
artist and
during
his
trips
in Greece
made some 400
sketches, along
with 600 sketches made
by
his
travelling
companion,
an Italian artist named Pomardi. From these he selected
thirty
which were
reproduced
as coloured
prints
in Views
of
Greece
(1821).
While
regretting
the restriction on the number of
prints
he could
reproduce,
Dodwell informed his readers that the views selected
... comprise
of
nearly
all the remains of
any
note in
Greece,
as well as those scenes
which have become
particularly
celebrated,
and
by
their connexion with the ancient
history
of that
country,
have obtained the admiration and recollection of the modern
traveller.19
Thermopylae
was one of these selected
views,
and his
print
of the Pass
[Figure 1]
reflects his
impression
of its
beauty.
In his
explanation
of the
print,
Dodwell described how
... the
eye
is attracted to the
massy
form of Mt.
Oeta,
covered with forests and broken
with
glens
and
valleys.
The sun was
setting
behind the
mountain,
which was
enveloped
in a tint of aerial blue.20
The
physical beauty again predominated.
Dodwell saw no need to
discuss the events that took
place
here,
that
is,
the reason this scene
was
'particularly
celebrated'. That would have been well known to his
216
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
Fig.
1:
'Thermopylae' by
Edward Dodwell from Views in Greece
(1821).
readers. The mere act of
selecting Thermopylae
for inclusion was
testament
enough
to the
importance
of the
place.
However his con-
centration on the
beauty
of the
place
served to
emphasize
this im-
portance.
This
highly
sentimental reaction to
landscape
is
pivotal
in the
way
Dodwell viewed
Thermopylae.
The
'sublimity'
of the
place
for the
Romantics was an inextricable combination of aesthetic
beauty
-
its
appearance
- and
spiritual beauty
-
effectively
the events that took
place
there and the ideas those events
represented.
Yet not all travellers found
the Pass beautiful. Edward Clarke had visited the Pass some five
years
before
Dodwell,
and
provides
a
sharp
contrast. His
anticipation
as he
approached
it reveals his
feelings
on the
subject:
We now set out
upon
the most
interesting part
of all our
travels,
-
an
expedition
to the
STRAITS OF THERMOPYLAE.21
This is a
significant
statement for a man whose travels had
already
taken
in much of
Europe, Egypt, Palestine,
and Greece. His
thoughts
on
leaving
the
pass
are worth
quoting
in full:
We looked back towards the whole
passage
with
regret; marvelling,
at the same
time,
that
we should
quit
with reluctance a
place, which,
without the interest thrown over it
by
antient
history,
would be one of the most
disagreeable upon
earth. Unwholesome
air,
217
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
mephitic
exhalations
bursting through
the rifted and rotten surface of a
corrupted soil,
as
if the land around were
diseased;
a
filthy
and fetid
quagmire;
'a heaven fat with
frogs';
stagnant
but
reeking pools;
hot and
sulphureous springs;
in
short,
such a scene of
morbid
nature,
as
suggested
to the fertile
imagination
of the antient Poets their ideas of a
land
poisoned by
'the blood of
Nessus',
and that calls to mind their
descriptions
of
Tartarus.22
This
picturesque description
leaves little doubt as to Clarke's
impres-
sion. Dodwell's
'voluptuous
blandishments' find no
place
in such a
landscape.
And
yet
Clarke
proved
himself as much a Romantic as
Dodwell.
Despite
the
physical appearance, Thermopylae
was still
sublime:
... [such a
scene]
can
only
become
delightful
from the most
powerful
circumstances of
association that were ever
produced by
causes
diametrically opposite;-
an association
combining,
in the mere mention of the
place,
all that is
great,
and
good,
and
honourable;
all that has been embalmed as most dear in the minds of
grateful prosperity.
In the
overwhelming
recollection of the sacrifice that was here
offered, every
other considera-
tion is
forgotten;
the Pass
of Thermopylae
becomes
consecrated;
it is made a source of the
best
feelings
of the human
heart;
and it 'shall be had in ever
lasting
remembrance'.23
For
Clarke, Thermopylae's spiritual beauty
is
emphasized by
its
physical
ugliness. Despite
the 'fetid
quagmire',
it is still 'consecrated'. While
Dodwell had
expressed
the
sublimity
of the
place
in terms of its
beauty,
and illustrated it with his
painting,
Clarke saw it in terms of the
remembrance of the event. Yet Clarke
clearly
felt he could not
ignore
the
landscape,
and so rather than avoid the
seeming paradox
between
the
physical appearance
and the
spiritual 'beauty',
he uses them
together.
Thus his illustration of the Pass
[Figure 2]
concentrates on
the heroes who fell there. His identification of the tumulus as the
Spartans' grave
- the
polyandrium
mentioned
by
Strabo - was confident
and
boldly
stated.24 His
engraving
of it served to illustrate what he saw as
the most
significant aspect
of the
site, namely
the sacrifice of the Greeks:
this
predominates
over
'every
other consideration'. This too is
part
of
the
landscape.
Thus while
only
one of these writers
expressed Thermopylae
in terms
of the
landscape,
both the Romantic writers reacted to
it,
and both used
it to
emphasize
the 'sublime' nature of the
place.
In
essence,
their
attitudes to what the Pass
represented
was
remarkably
similar.
However,
it
was,
of
course,
the Romantic
poets
who most
fully
realized the
power
of
landscape,
and within this context it was
Byron
who most
fully
illustrated it. In The
Gaiour,
written in
1813,
some two
years
after his
first visit to
Greece,
he uses the
landscape
to its fullest effect:
218
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
Fig.
2: 'The Tomb of the
Spartans'
from E.
Clarke,
Travels in Various
Countries,
vol. 4
(1812).
Clime of the
unforgotten
brave! -
Whose land from
plain
to mountain-cave
Was Freedoms's home or
Glory's grave
-
Shrine of the
mighty!
Can it
be,
That this is all remains of thee?
Approach
thou craven
crouching
slave -
Say,
is this not
Thermopylae?
These waters blue that round
you
lave
Oh servile
offspring
of the free -
Pronounce what
sea,
what shore is this?
The
gulf,
the rock of Salamis!
... Bear
witness, Greece, thy living page,
Attest it
many
a deathless
age!
While
kings
in
dusty
darkness
hid,
Have left a nameless
pyramid,
Thy
heroes
-
though
the
general
doom
Hath
swept
the column from their
tomb,
A
mightier
monument
command,
The mountains of their native land!25
Here
Thermopylae
and Salamis exist in the
land,
and
yet
not in the
people.
Moreover,
the land is the monument to the ancient heroes in
219
. : :: .. ... ...
x ::::::;:::::: :
,:::, ::: :::::S:::,s:s:s:s:.-::. :::: ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ::::i:::::::
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
ways
which marble can never be: not
only
is it where
they fought,
but
also it is what
they fought
for.
Indeed,
man-made monuments seem to
speak
more of man's
vanity
than his deeds: one is reminded of
Shelley's
Ozymandias. Thus,
in
turning
to
landscape
instead of
monuments,
the
focus of idealization of the ancient world is
changed
from art to action.
The worth of the ancients was best seen in their
deeds,
which
display
their
virtue,
rather than their
genius
for art. This is not to
say
that
ancient art was
ignored,
but that admiration of ancient Greece was
concentrating
on the ancient Greeks themselves.
In the extracts from Dodwell and
Byron
one can see the source of
philhellenism.
Like
many travellers, they
were shocked
by
the state of the
Greece
they
saw. The Greeks
displayed
an
ignorance
of their own
past
and a
seeming
contentment with
'slavery'
which seemed
quite
at odds
with the virtues of their
supposed
ancestors.
Many
turned
away, blaming
the situation on the moral
degradation
of the
Greeks,
and
becoming
what
one modern commentator described as 'miso-hellenists'.26 For these
observers,
the modern Greeks had
betrayed
their
heritage,
and were so
far
changed
that no reversal of their fortune was
possible.
A
few,
however,
not
only
blamed this state of affairs on the
Turks,
but also
sought
to
rectify
it. This is
perhaps
the best definition of
philhellenism.
Working
on the idea that
liberty
and virtue are inextricable - an idea
common
throughout
the
eighteenth century
and shown in Glover's
speech
of Leonidas to his
Spartans quoted
above -
they hoped
for
both a
political
and moral
regeneration
of Greece. The solution
lay
in
educating
the Greeks to their
glorious past,
and then
inspiring
them with
exemplars
from it. And the most
powerful
of these
exemplars
was
Thermopylae.
* * *
Before
going
on to illustrate the
ways
in which
Thermopylae
was used
within this
political
context,
it should be
explained why Thermopylae,
as
opposed
to
any
other
exemplar,
is so
powerful.
The first reason is a
practical
one: for the
purposes
of
rousing
the Greeks
against
the
Turks,
Leonidas was
simply
the most suitable Greek
figure.
To the
philhellenes,
the
age
after Alexander was one of decline whilst
Byzantium
was not
even seen as Greek. Within the limited
period they considered, many
military figures abound,
but each had certain limitations.
Alexander,
despite
his
victories,
had too
many personal
vices and often
appeared
as
an
example
to
avoid,
not to
emulate; Epaminondas, although militarily
successful and
seemingly virtuous,
made his
reputation
in battles
against
220
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
other
Greeks,
and as such was
hardly
suitable as a
unifying figure. Only
the characters of the Persian Wars
presented
the
right image
of
patriotic
defence of
liberty,
whilst the wars also
provided
an
easy parallel
between
the Turks and the Persians. Yet of the heroes of the Persian
Wars,
which
would serve as the best
exemplar?
There is Miltiades of
Marathon,
later
convicted of
tyranny;
Themistocles of
Salamis,
who later was ostracized
and
sought refuge
in
Persia;
Pausanias of
Plataea,
later accused of
attempts
at
tyranny; Leotychides
of
Mycale,
later
disgraced
over
bribery.
The fact that
by dying
in
battle,
Leonidas could not blacken
his own name is not
unimportant.
He alone was untainted.
The second reason for
Thermopylae's importance
is the
key
to the
continual
power
of the battle as an
exemplar,
from
antiquity
to the
present day.
In
dying,
Leonidas became a
martyr
for Greece. Modern
historians
may argue
that he was
thinking only
of
Sparta,
but the idea
that he was a
pan-hellenist
dates back at least to
Plutarch,
and is
implied
by
Herodotus.
Moreover,
both Herodotus and Plutarch
agree
- itself a
rare occurrence
-
that Leonidas knew he was
going
to
die,
and chose
only
those 'with sons
living'
to
accompany
him.
Thermopylae
was not a
defeat,
it was a sacrifice. As such it becomes a moral
act,
as much as the
death of Socrates or
Jesus.27
Three extracts from the
writings
of Samuel
Taylor Coleridge
serve to illustrate the idea. The first is taken from his
notebooks:
Moral excellence almost essential to the sublime effect of
particular action,
Leonidas &
his
Spartans
- the 23rd
Dragoons
at Talavera - still more the Mamaluke & Winkelried.28
Coleridge
is
contrasting
two kinds of
courage,
on the one hand that of
Leonidas or
Winkelried,29
on the other that of the
Dragoons
at
Talavera30 or the Mamaluke.31 He differentiates the
types
of heroism
shown
by
Winkelried and the Mamaluke as follows:
In the former the state of mind arose from
Reason, Morals, Liberty,
the sense of
duty
owing
to the
independence
of his
country
etc
- in
short, containing
or
compatible
with
the
highest perfection
&
development
of the human
Faculties,
Moral & Intellectual
-
in
the
latter, predicative only
of mere animal
Habit, Ferocity,
& unreasoned
Antipathy
to
Strangers
.. .32
The essence of these
definitions,
as shown in the first
extract,
can also be
applied
to Leonidas as
opposed
to the
Dragoons.33
In an article in The
Courier,
Coleridge
takes the idea
further, again using
Leonidas as an
example
of the
positive
kind of heroism:
221
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
The
splendid qualities
of
courage
and
enthusiasm, which, being
the
frequent
com-
panions
and in
given
circumstances the
necessary agents
of
virtue,
are too often
themselves hailed as virtues
by
their own title. But
courage
and enthusiasm have
equally
characterised the best and worst
beings,
a
Satan, equally
with an Abdiel
-
a
Bonaparte
equally
with a Leonidas.34
These extracts show
Coleridge's thinking clearly:
the heroism of a
Leonidas is a moral heroism. While it necessitates
physical bravery,
it
is much more than that because the source of that
bravery
is moral. It is
premeditated
and
inspired by
a love of
'liberty',
which to the
eighteenth-
and
nineteenth-century
mind was
inextricably
connected to
'virtue',
as is
shown in the
quote
from Glover's Leonidas. The
patriotic
self-sacrifice
for
liberty
is the ultimate act of
virtue,
and so in the case of
Thermopylae
the martial overtones are
secondary
to the virtues of the heroes. As such
Thermopylae
serves as a
perfect exemplar
for
philhellenism. Firstly,
the
martial element serves as a
perfect military exemplar,
the
battling
of
overwhelming
odds
against
the 'old
enemy',
the Turks
being
identified
with the Persians. The fact that
Thermopylae
was a defeat is unim-
portant
because as an
exemplar
it shows the attitude and
courage
with
which such a battle should be
fought,
and furthermore it was seen as the
first
step
to the eventual Greek
victory. Secondly,
its
overriding
moral
element
provides
for the idea of moral
regeneration.
As such the twin
aims of
philhellenism
- moral and
political regeneration
- find their ideal
exemplar
in
Thermopylae.
* * *
The use of
Thermopylae,
and of Leonidas in
particular,
to
encourage
ideas
of,
and
support for,
Greek
liberation,
can be seen
clearly
in the
1770s. Marie Gabriel
Auguste Florent,
Comte de Choiseul-Gouffier
visited Greece in the late 1770s and
published Voyage Pittoresque
de la
Grece in 1782. That he later became the French ambassador to the
Ottoman
Empire
and
completely
recanted his
philhellenic
sentiments is
not
important
here. What is
significant
is his use of Leonidas. The
frontispiece
to the
Voyage [Figure 3] depicts
'Greece in
chains',
and is
explained
in detail. She is surrounded
by
monuments to classical Greek
heroes who
fought
for
liberty,
and rests on the tomb of
Leonidas,
behind
which is a
pillar bearing
Simonides' famous
epigram
to the
Spartans.
On
the rock above her are the words 'Exoriare
Aliquis'.
That much is
explained. Any eighteenth-century
reader
cognisant
with the classics
would understand the
implication.
The
quote
comes from
Virgil:
'exoriare
aliquis
nostris ex ossibus ultor'35
-
'let some
avenging spirit
222
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
Fig.
3: 'Greece in Chains' from
Choiseul-Gouffier, Voyage Pittoresque
de la
Grece
(1782).
arise from these bones' - and is Dido's final curse on the
departing
Aeneas. The inference is unmistakable: while other heroes have monu-
ments,
only
Leonidas is described as
having
a tomb. Of all the heroes
mentioned,
Leonidas has
pride
of
place,
and it is on his remains that the
chained
figure
of Greece rests. As
such,
the call for an
avenger
centres
around him. While other heroes can serve as
inspiration,
it is the
spirit
of
Leonidas that must be emulated.
As one would
expect,
it is
Byron
who most
fully
illustrates this idea.
223
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
Childe Harold's
Pilgrimage
was
mostly
written in
Greece,
during Byron's
first visit in 1810-11.
Fair Greece! sad relic of
departed
worth!
Immortal, though
no more!
though fallen, great!
Who now shall lead
thy
scatter'd children
forth,
And now
long
accustom'd
bondage
uncreate?
Not such
thy
sons who whilome did
await,
The
hopeless
warriors of a
willing doom,
In bleak
Thermopylae's sepulchral
strait-
Oh! who that
gallant spirit
shall
resume,
Leap
from Eurotas'
banks,
and call thee from the tomb?36
He
compares
the
glorious past
with the
degraded present
state of
Greece,
and then calls on Leonidas - 'that
gallant spirit'
-
having already
shown him to be the
height
of ancient
excellence,
as the
spirit
the
modern Greeks must emulate. The difference between ancient and
modern Greece - the
'departed
worth' - is the
presence
of such a
spirit.
A
year
after Childe Harold
appeared,
William
Haygarth published
Greece,
a Poem. Little is known of
Haygarth,
and his
poem
was over-
shadowed
by Byron's,37
but in it he
expressed
a much more fervent
philhellenism
than
any
other writer of the time:
I have ventured to
predict
in
poetry
what I
certainly
should not be so
hardy
as foretell in
prose
- the moral
regeneration
of Greece.38
Few at the time dared to show such
optimism,
even the likes of
Byron
restricting
themselves to calls for such a
regeneration.
No other
poet
so
illustrates the
philhellenic
notion that the Greeks needed to be educated
as to their
past. Haygarth imagined
himself with a Greek
peasant
at the
site of
Thermopylae, promising:
I will strive
To raise
thy
broken
spirit,
and with tales
Of
thy
forefathers'
deeds,
waken the fire
Which
slumbers,
not
extinguish'd,
in
thy
breast.
(Greece
1.517-20)
There follows a
stirring
account of the 'heroes who here fell In Free-
dom's
phalanx' (1.522-3)
and
'died,
as
they
had
liv'd, triumphantly'
(1.573).
Then
Haygarth
told the
peasant
the
purpose
of the tale:
Deeply impress
this tale
upon thy breast;
And when
thy country
calls thee from
thy plains
To
fight
for
liberty,
remember those
Who
bled, unconquer'd,
with Leonidas!
(Greece
1.574-77)
224
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
Haygarth
thus
explained clearly
the
purpose
of these classical exem-
plars:
the
inspiring
of the modern Greeks to the moral
regeneration
which was the
precondition
of
political regeneration. Furthermore,
he
showed his
optimism
for such a
regeneration
in
asking
not whether such
a revolt will
occur,
but rather when it will
happen.
In ancient Greece
'ev'ry
father
taught
his child these tales'
(1.578-79)
but now 'those times
are
past' (1.590).
It is the
foreigner's
task to tell the tales:
... now a
stranger's
hand
Must
sweep
the
strings,
and
feebly
wake the chords
To tell
Greece,
how noble were the
sires,
How weak and how
degen'rate
are the sons.
(Greece 1.590-93)
Haygarth
not
only sought
to
inspire
the idea of a Greek
revival,
but even
described the role the
philhellenes
would have to
play.
This
philhellen-
ism
permeated every aspect
of his
poem.
He
emphasized
the
importance
of
Thermopylae
in his water-colour of the Pass
[Figure 4],
one of nine
plates
that adorned the
poem.
Here the view is dominated
by
Mt.
Oeta,
that 'Bulwark of
Greece,
whilst Greece still had a name'
(1.601).
Once
again
there is the recurrent theme of
landscape, yet
while Dodwell used
the
landscape
of
Thermopylae
to show how much Greece had
changed,
Haygarth highlighted
that which remained the same. He used the
image
of the mountain to show what the Greeks had
fought
for: the
gates,
and
very freedom,
of Greece. In so
doing,
he drew attention to the
present
plight
of Greece and the idea of
regaining
that freedom. For even
though
freedom has
flown,
the
gates
still stand.
Six
years later,
on the
very
eve of the Greek War of
Independence,
Byron
made the call even more clear. 'The Isles of Greece' is a
song
within Don
Juan sung by
a Greek bard
lamenting
the condition of his
country.
He reflects on Marathon where he 'dream'd that Greece
might
still be
free',
and on 'sea-born
Salamis',
but
they
are
only
memories.
Then he makes what is
probably philhellenism's
most direct invocation
to
Thermopylae:
Must we but
weep
o'er
days
more blest?
Must we but blush?
-
Our fathers bled.
Earth! render back from out
thy
breast
A remnant of our
Spartan
dead!
Of the three hundred
grant
but
three,
To make a new
Thermopylae!39
225
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
Fig.
4:
'Thermopylae' by
William
Haygarth
from
Greece,
a Poem
(1814).
It is
by recreating
the
spirit
of
Thermopylae
that
Greece,
in both a moral
and
political
sense,
can be
rejuvenated.
That is what is meant
by making
a new
Thermopylae.
It is the
reclaiming
of the
spirit
that,
for the
philhellenes,
was the
very
essence of ancient Greece.
* * *
The effects of
philhellenism
on the attainment of Greek
Independence
is
too broad a
question
to address here. Suffice it to
say
that the
philhellenes
who
fought
in Greece itself died in sufficient numbers to
warm western
Europe
to the cause.
Furthermore, despite
the
persistent
opposition
of the Great Powers to
any
form of Greek
Independence,
it
was those same Powers that
seemingly inadvertently
ensured it. Of all
the senior British
politicians
of the
time,
only George Canning
was a
philhellene, Byron describing
him as 'our
last,
our
best,
our
only
orator'.40 It was under
Canning's
brief
ministry
in 1827 that the
Treaty
of
London,
that called for an end to the
ongoing
war in
Greece,
was
signed;
and it was under the
provisions
of that
treaty
that
Edward
Codrington,
himself a
philhellene,
led the allied fleet into
Navarino.
It was in terms of
awakening
the Greeks to their
past,
or at least the
226
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
philhellenic interpretation
of that
past,
that
philhellenism's
real success
lay. Among
Greeks educated outside Greece itself
western-style phil-
hellenism,
based on an admiration of
antiquity,
was
taking
root.
Rigas
Velestinlis, although
born in
Thessaly, spent
much of his life
travelling
and worked at the French consulate in Wallachia. Executed
by
the
Turks in
1798,
he became a
martyr
for Greek
liberation,
and his Hellenic
Marseillaise a
revolutionary
anthem. Translated
by Byron
as a Greek
War
Song,
the
poem, having
called
upon
the Greeks to
rise,
then turns to
the most
powerful
of classical
exemplars:
Sparta, Sparta, why
in slumbers
Lethargic
dost thou lie?
Awake and
join thy
numbers
With
Athens,
old
ally!
Leonidas
recalling,
That chief of ancient
song,
Who sav'd
ye
once from
falling,
The terrible! the
strong!
Who made that bold diversion
In old
Thermopylae,
And
warring
with the Persian
To
keep
his
country
free;
With his three hundred
waging
The
battle, long
he
stood,
And like a lion
raging,
Expir'd
in seas of blood.
(stanza 3)
Rigas
called the
spirit
of Leonidas from the
grave
as Choiseul-Gouffier
had
done,
and related the events of the
battle,
thus
fulfilling
the
philhellenists'
aim of
educating
the Greeks to their own
past.
Antonios
Martelaos,
a resident on the Ionian islands which
during
his lifetime
were under
Venetian, French, Russian,
and British
control,
also wrote a
Marseillaise. He too called on Leonidas:
Rise to see how
many
Like Leonidas there will be!
Rise and feel
happy,
For Greece will live
again.
Rise and
you
will see
How
bravely
we
fight;
How we beat our
enemies;
How much we resemble
you!41
These
verses,
written in the
years
between the two
great
revolts
against
the
Turks,
not
surprisingly
focused on the martial
element,
and
227
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
Leonidas was evoked as a martial
figure.
However,
after Greece had
won her
independence Thermopylae began
to take on the moral
connotations
implicit
in the
writings
of
Coleridge
and others. Con-
stantine
Cavafy's Thermopylae
was written some
seventy years
after the
end of the war and shows what
Thermopylae
had come to
represent:
a
moral idea,
shed of its martial
overtones,
a
paradigm
of the
very
kind of
moral excellence the miso-hellenists had
thought
to be
missing
and the
philhellenes
had
sought
to restore. The
poem
shows
that,
even if
only
within the bounds of
literature, they
had succeeded:
Honour to those who in the life
they
lead
define and
guard
a
Thermopylae.
Never
betraying
what is
right,
consistent and
just
in all
they
do ...
And even more honour is due to them
when
they
foresee
(as
many
do
foresee)
That
Ephialtes
will turn
up
in the
end,
that the Medes will break
through
after all.42
NOTES
*
The illustrations to this article are
reproduced
with the
permission
of the
Librarian, John
Rylands University Library
of Manchester.
1.
George Saintsbury
claimed that it would be 'difficult to
imagine,
and would
hardly
be
possible
to
find,
even in the
long
list of mistaken
'long poem'
writers of the last two
centuries,
more tedious
stuff than his'
(The Cambridge History of English Literature,
vol. X
(1913), 149);
E. M. W.
Tillyard
goes
so far as to redefine
epic poetry itself,
and
specifically
excludes Leonidas
(The English Epic
and
its
Background (1968), 6, 494).
However neither critic
supports
his claims. William
Cowper
once
wrote that The
Athenaid,
Glover's
sequel
to
Leonidas,
was 'condemned I dare
say by
those who have
never read the half of it'
(letter
to
Lady Hesketh,
4 Feb
1789),
and his words can be taken for the
vast
majority
of modern critics' attitudes to Glover's work in
general.
See
my
article on Glover in
P. N. Review
(forthcoming).
2.
J. Collins,
The Greek
Influence
on
English Poetry (1910),
63.
3.
Joseph Simpson,
The Patriot
(1785); J.
P.
Roberdeau, Thermopylae,
or Invasion
Repulsed
(1792).
4.
May 31,
1737. See Works
of Swift,
ed. Scott
(1824),
73.
5.
J. Warton, Essay
on the Genius
of Pope (1782),
ii.
401n; J. Scott,
Poetical Works
(1782) 207;
R.
Southey, Joan of
Arc
(1794), preface;
letter to H. W.
Bedford,
13 November 1794
(in
The
Life
and
Correspondence of
Robert
Southey,
ed. Charles
Southey (London, 1849),
i.
191).
6. H.
Fielding,
A
Journey
From this World into the Next
(1742)
c. 7.
Goldgar argues
that
Fielding's praise
of Glover is a 'remnant of his
anti-Walpole partisanship',
a
vestige
of the faction -
of which both
Fielding
and Glover were a
part
- that
sought
to
depose
Robert
Walpole's ministry
(Weslyan
Edition
of
the Works
of Henry Fielding:
Miscellanies Vol.
II,
ed. B. A.
Goldgar (1983),
37
n.
2). However,
the work was
completed
after
Walpole's
fall from
power,
and as
Fielding
felt free to
criticize
many
of his former
colleagues
in the faction
(ibid, xxv), any praise
that remains is
surely
not such a 'remnant'.
7. Letter to
John Hanson, April 2, 1807;
see
Byron's
Letters and
Journals,
vol.
I,
ed
L. A. Marchand
(1993),
113.
8. The
only
case in which he deviates from the sources is in
having
Leonidas as the last of the
Greeks to
die,
a
necessary
device for the central hero of an
epic poem.
228
TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
9. For
example
T.
Arnold,
The
English Poets,
ed. Ward
(1889),
239; W.
Minto,
Literature in the
Georgian
Era
(1894),
75; Percival, Political Ballads
(1916), 144;
E.
Rothstein,
Restoration and 18th
Century Poetry (1981),
205; L.
Sutherland,
Politics and Finance in the 18th
Century (1984), 78;
C.
Gerrard,
The Patriot
Opposition
to
Walpole (1994),
80.
10.
Henry
Pemberton wrote the work of
literary
criticism Observations on
Poetry, Especially
the
Epic,
Occasioned
by
the Late Poem
Upon
Leonidas
(1738), pointing
out at
great length
Glover's
Homeric
qualities. Poets, too,
made the connection.
See,
for
example,
Matthew
Green,
who
described Glover as:
This,
this is
he,
that was foretold
Should emulate our Greeks of old.
(From
The
Spleen (1737);
see Alexander
Chamlers,
The Works
of
the
English
Poets
(1810),
xv.
167).
Similarly,
William
Thompson
wrote to Glover that 'Homer's Self revives
again
in thee'
(From
To
the Author
of
Leonidas: A Poem, An
Epistle (1757),
line
37).
11. T.
Ram,
The Neo-classical
Epic
1650-1720
(1971).
12.
Ibid.,
182.
13. Ibid., 8-14,
32ff.
14. R.
Wood,
A
Comparative
View
of
the Antient and
present
State
of
the Troade. To which is
prefixed
an
Essay
on the
Original
Genius
of
Homer
(1767);
later
republished
as An
Essay
on the
Original Genius and
Writings of Homer, with a
Comparative
View of the Ancient and
present
State
of
the
Troade, ed. J. Bryant (1775).
15. R. Collvil, 'The Caledonian Heroine', line 355, in Occasional Poems
(1771);
J. Scott, 'The
Muse', lines 48-9, in The Poetical Works
of John
Scott
(1782);
H.
Boyd,
'The Helots
-
A
Tragedy',
lines 313-15, in Poems (1793).
16. R. Pococke,
A
Description of
the East, vol. I (1743),
42.
17. In 480 B.C. the Pass of
Thermopylae,
sandwiched between the mountains and the sea, was
wide
enough only for two carts to
pass
one another. A
gradual deposit of silt has now created a
plain
some four miles wide, although
it has been estimated that in the
early
nineteenth
century
it was
considerably less than that
(G. Szemler et al., Thermopylai: Myth
and
Reality
in 480 B.C.
(Chicago
1996), Map I).
18. E. Dodwell, A Classical and
Topological
Tour
Through Greece during
the Years 1801, 1805 and
1806
(London, 1819),
ii. 66.
19. E. Dodwell, Views
of Greece (London, 1821), preface.
20. Ibid, Description
to Plate
of Thermopylae.
21. E. Clarke, Travels in Various Countries, vol. 4
(London, 1812), 238.
22. Ibid., 251.
23.
Ibid.,
251-2
24. Ibid., 240-1.
25. Lines 103-13 and 126-33.
26. G.
Dandoulakis, The
Struggle for
Greek
Independence:
the Contribution
of
Greek and
English
Poetry, Dissertation, Loughborough University
of
Technology (1985),
305.
27. The idea of
comparing
Leonidas with
Jesus appeared
in The Athenaid, Glover's 30-book
sequel
to Leonidas.
Although
Herodotus records that Xerxes had the
Spartan's
head erected on a
pole,
Glover has the Persian
king crucify
Leonidas'
corpse.
The
passages
make an
implicit
comparison
with the crucifixion of Jesus and the idea of self-sacrifice. See The Athenaid 15.244-
87, 17.327-34, 20.246-355, 24.292-97, 26.145-48 and 313-22.
28. K. Coburn
(ed.),
The Notebooks
of
Samuel
Taylor Coleridge (London, 1973), vol.3, no. 3637.
29. Arnold von Winkelried, a Swiss national hero who died at the battle of
Semprach
in 1386
against
the
Hapsburgs. Coleridge
describes how he 'with his bundle of
Spears turned towards his
Breast in order to break the Austrian Pike-men'
(Coleridge, Notebooks, vol. 3, no.3312) sacrificed
his life to win Swiss freedom. See F. Adams and C.
Cunningham,
The Swiss
Confederation (London,
1889) 6, and G. Thuirer, Free and Swiss
(London, 1970), 36.
30. At the battle of Talavera in 1809 the 23rd
Dragoons charged
the French
guns,
and
although
the
charge
was broken
by
an unseen watercourse
they
continued the attack, heroically
if somewhat
pointlessly, losing
over half their
complement
in the
process.
See J. Fortescue, The
History of
the
British
Army (London, 1912),
vii. 251-4, who claims the
dragoons attacked 'without any word of
command' and describes the
charge
as a 'mad
exploit' (p.253).
229
230 TO MAKE A NEW THERMOPYLAE
31. The Mamalukes
(or Mamelukes)
were
Egyptian
mercenaries.
Coleridge (Notebooks,
vol.
3,
no.
3312)
relates the
story
of one
who,
when his horse refused to
charge
the French
lines,
backed
the animal onto the
enemy, killing
himself in the
process.
32.
Notebooks,
vol.
3,
no. 3312.
33. It should be noted that
Coleridge's
definition of the
Dragoons'
actions is not as harsh or
negative
as that of the
Mamaluke, although
the motivation behind those actions - violent instinct
rather than moral excellence - is similar.
34. The
Courier,
13
January
1809.
35. Aeneid 4.625.
36. Canto
II,
stanza 73.
37. Terence
Spencer
wrote that 'of all the
philhellenic poets
of the first two decades of the
nineteenth
century,
the one who was most
cruelly
crushed out of existence
by
the
reputation
of
Byron
was William
Haygarth
...
[his poem]
was
published,
a
splendid quarto,
in 1814 - too
late;
for
the sun of
Byron
was
already
above the horizon.' (Fair Greece,
Sad
Relic,
2nd
ed., 1974, 281).
The
effect of this
'crushing'
out of existence seems all the harsher when one discovers that
Haygarth
wrote much of his
poem
in 1811 while still in
Greece,
before
Byron completed
Childe
Harold,
and
did not
publish
until 1814
merely
because of what he described as 'the natural
apprehension
which
the Author feels for the fate of a first
performance' (Greece,
a
Poem, preface, v).
38.
Greece,
a
Poem,
in three
parts;
with
Notes,
Classical
Illustrations,
and Sketches
of
the
Scenery
(London, 1814),
Notes
p.
276.
39. Canto
III,
stanza
86,
verse 7
(lines 725-30).
40.
Age of
Bronze
(1823),
stanza
13,
line 552.
41. Translated
by
G.
Dandoulakis, op. cit.,
278.
42. Translated
by
E.
Keeley,
Passions and Ancient
Days (1972).

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