Pisistratus

Now of these two peoples, Croesus learned that the Attic was held in subjection and divided into factions by Pisistratus, son of Hippocrates, who at that time was sovereign over the Athenians.

The Athenians did, and by this means Pisistratus gained Athens for the third time, rooting his sovereignty in a strong guard and revenue collected both from Athens and from the district of the river Strymon, and he took hostage the sons of the Athenians who remained and did not leave the city at once, and placed these in Naxos.

Then Megacles, harassed by factional strife, sent a message to Pisistratus offering him his daughter to marry and the sovereign power besides.

For this reason those who say that Pisistratus was the beloved of Solon, and that he was general in the war against the Megarians over Salamis, are plainly talking nonsense;

and the third that of the men of the hills, over which Pisistratus was set, who seemed to be the most democratic.

For having first spread a report that Athena was bringing Pisistratus back, and having found a tall and beautiful woman—as Herodotus says, from the deme of the Paeanians, but as some say, a Thracian garland-seller from Collytus, whose name was Phye—he had her imitate the goddess in her adornment and brought her in along with him;

One might find many other things—indeed, simply all that have to do with some work or action—common to philosophers and to orators, that is, to such orators as are not vulgar mongers nor hirelings looking only to money and to private disputes about contracts or such matters, but are deemed worthy to give counsel and make laws in public—just as, I suppose, Pericles and Thucydides did at Athens, and …

So that one might call Lycurgus the daimon of the Lacedaemonians—for at his bidding the Lacedaemonians even now are scourged and camp in the open and go lightly clad, and endure many other hard things that to other men would seem grievous—and Pisistratus the daimon of the Athenians of old.

For Pisistratus the tyrant had also purified it before;

For when Pisistratus had died at an advanced age in possession of the tyranny, it was not Hipparchus, as the generality suppose, but Hippias, that was eldest of his sons, and obtained the government.

For the commons, knowing by report that the tyranny of Pisistratus and his sons had proved galling at last, and, moreover, that it had not even been put down by themselves and Harmodius, but by the Lacedaemonians, were always afraid, and took every thing suspiciously.

to whom, because as a private man fears are set against him, commands are given and continued, and he is fenced about even with bodyguards, as Pisistratus at Athens;

how many before him, in the very flower of Greece, was Pisistratus!

And by the counsel of the Athenian Amphilytus, Pisistratus too established his tyranny, when the man had pointed out the moment for the attack.

For they were kinsmen of Pisistratus and before he came to power were closest to him of all the citizens, but they refused to share his tyranny;

we see the people at war with other polities which fail to please them, overturning them and slaying those at their head, but continuing to enjoy this polity for not less than a thousand years, remaining loyal to it from the time when they received it down to the age of Solon and the tyranny of Pisistratus, who, after he had placed himself at the head of the people and done much harm to the city a …

the tyrant of the Athenians, is recorded—when a drunken guest had said many things against his cruelty, and there was no lack of those willing to lend a hand against him, and one from here, another from there set torches beneath the fire—to have borne it with a calm mind and to have answered those who were provoking him that he was no more angry at the man than if someone with bandaged eyes had run into him.

nor do I see why self-restraint should be difficult, when I know that even the tempers of tyrants, swollen by fortune and licence, have repressed the savagery familiar to them.