Greek Texts & Translations

The Messenians themselves were treated in this way: First they exacted an oath that they would never rebel or attempt any kind of revolution. Secondly, though no fixed tribute was imposed on them, they used to bring the half of all the produce of their fields to Sparta. It was also ordained that for the funerals of the kings and other magistrates men should come from Messene with their wives in black garments, and a penalty was laid on those who disobeyed.

As to the wanton punishments which they inflicted on the Messenians, this is what is said in Tyrtaeus' poems: Like asses worn by their great burdens, bringing of dire necessity to their masters the half of all the fruits the corn-land bears.
Tyrtaeus, unknown location.That they were compelled to share their mourning, he shows by the following: Wailing for their masters, they and their wives alike, whensoever the baneful doom of death came upon any.
Tyrtaeus, unknown location.

In these straits the Messenians, foreseeing no kindness from the Lacedaemonians, and thinking death in battle or a complete migration from Peloponnese preferable to their present lot, resolved at all costs to revolt. They were incited to this mainly by the younger men, who were still without experience of war but were of high spirit and preferred death in a free country, even though slavery might bring happiness in all else.

Of the young men who had grown up in Messenia the best and most numerous were round Andania, and among them was Aristomenes, who to this day is worshipped as a hero among the Messenians. They think that even the circumstances of his birth were notable, for they assert that a spirit or a god united with his mother, Nicoteleia, in the form of a serpent. I know that the Macedonians tell a similar story about Olympias, and the Sicyonians about Aristodama, but there is this difference:

The Messenians do not make Aristomenes the son of Heracles or of Zeus, as the Macedonians do with Alexander and Ammon, and the Sicyonians with Aratus and Asclepius. Most of the Greeks say that Pyrrhus was the father of Aristomenes, but I myself know that in their libations the Messenians call him Aristomenes son of Nicomedes. He then, being in the full vigor of youth and courage, with others of the nobles incited them to revolt. This was not done openly at first, but they sent secretly to Argos and to the Arcadians, to ask if they were ready to help unhesitatingly and no less energetically than in the former war.

Tyrtaeus has not recorded the names of the kings then reigning in Lacedaemon, but Rhianos stated in his epic that Leotychides was king at the time of this war. I cannot agree with him at all on this point. Though Tyrtaeus makes no statement, he may be regarded as having done so by the following; there are lines of his which refer to the first war: Around it they fought unceasingly for nineteen years, ever maintaining a stout heart, the warrior fathers of our fathers.
Tyrtaeus, unknown location.

It is obvious then that the Messenians went to war now in the second generation after the first war, and the sequence of time shows that the kings of Sparta at that time were Anaxander the son of Eurycrates, son of Polydorus, and of the other house Anaxidamus the son of Zeuxidamus, son of Archidamus, son of Theopompus. I go as far as the third in descent from Theopompus, because Archidamus the son of Theopompus died before his father, and the kingdom of Theopompus passed to his grandson, Zeuxidamus. But Leotychides clearly succeeded Demaratus the son of Ariston, Ariston being sixth in descent from Theopompus.

In the first year after the revolt the Messenians engaged the Lacedaemonians at a place called Derae in Messenia, both sides being without their allies. Neither side won a clear victory, but Aristomenes is said to have achieved more than it seemed that one man could, so that, as he was of the race of the Aepytidae, they were for making him king after the battle. As he declined, they appointed him general with absolute power.