Nabis's Wife
When he had by these means put the greater number of
them out of the way, he next had constructed
a kind of machine, if machine it may be called,
which was the figure of a woman, clothed in costly garments,
and made to resemble with extraordinary fidelity the wife of
Nabis. Whenever then he summoned one of the citizens
with a view of getting some money from him, he used first to
employ a number of arguments politely expressed, pointing
out the danger in which the city stood from the threatening
attitude of the Achaeans, and explaining what a number of
mercenaries he had to support for their security, and the expenses which fell upon him for the maintenance of the national
religion and the needs of the State. If the listeners gave in
he was satisfied; but if they ever refused to comply with his
demand, he would say, "Perhaps I cannot persuade you, but I
think this lady Apéga will succeed in doing so." Apéga was
the name of his wife. Immediately on his saying these words,
the figure I have described was brought in. As soon as the
man offered his hand to the supposed lady to raise her from
her seat, the figure threw its arms round him and began drawing him by degrees towards its breasts. Now its arms, hands,
and breasts were full of iron spikes under its clothes. When
the tyrant pressed his hands on the back of the figure, and
then by means of the works dragged the man by degrees
closer and closer to its breasts, he forced him under this
torture to say anything. A good number of men who refused
his demands he destroyed in this way. note
