The following inscription, SEG 37, Nr. 340, published in 1987, records the sympolity of Mantinea with the nearby small town of Heliswon (probably in the early fourth century). In this case the city-state of Heliswon (line 5 - polis in the sense of "political entity") will be incorporated into Mantinea though the physical city of Heliswon (line 6 - polis in the sense of "physical city") will still exist. The inscription moreover shows that Mantinea - as presupposed by the Lacedaemonians' "dioecism" of it - did indeed grow through unions with nearby communities. Granted, a sympolity is not a synoecism; in the case of a synoecism all the Heliswasians would have moved to Mantinea. Whether the erstwhile Heliswasians were later on relocated to Mantinea so that the sympolity became a synoecism is pure speculation. In either case the Lacedaemonian "dioecism" should have brought the town of Heliswon along with its "autonomy" back into being.
The inscription, translated immediately below, finally shows how much thought went into regulating the technical details of such a political union. Lines 8-10 confirm that the sympolity will have no effect on religious observances in Heliswon. Lines 10-16 explain how lawsuits between Mantineans and former Heliswasians will be handled and confirm the validity of all contracts made between Heliswasians. Lines 16-24 deal with the registration of the Heliswasians as Mantinean citizens.
Gods! Good fortune!
Compact of the Mantineans and the Heliswasians. . .
. . . which the Mantineans and the Heliswasians have ratified. The Heliswasians shall be Mantineans, equal and alike, having in common all 5. things which the Mantineans too have, incorporating their land and their polis
Into Mantinea according to the laws of the Mantineans, while the polis of the Heliswasians remains just as it has for all time, with the Heliswasians being a village of the Mantineans. There shall be sacral ambassadors from Heliswon just as from other poleis. They shall sacrifice in 10. Heliswon and shall receive oracles according to their ancestral traditions. Lawsuits
The Heliswasians and the Mantineans shall prosecute against each other by the laws
Of the Mantineans, now that the Heliswasians have become Mantineans, for the future;
But matters from before then may not be the subject of lawsuits. As many contracts
As the Heliswasians happen to have among themselves from before they became
15. Mantineans, they shall be valid according to the laws which they themselves had when
They came to Mantinea. All the Heliswasians shall register themselves with the Epimeletai in Mantinea by their father's name according to age within ten days of when
The scribes come. But the Epimeletai shall take the registered names away to Mantinea and shall register them with the Thesmotoaroi under 20. Nices, the Damiorgos; and the Thesmotoaroi, once they have written (the names) on tablets,
Shall display them at the Council Chamber. But if anyone of those registered should deny
That someone is a Heliswasian, then he may denounce (him) before the Thesmotoaroi in
The year after that in which Nices was Damiorgos. But the person who is denounced shall
Plead his case before the 300 themselves. . .
Fresh off the success at Mantinea, the Lacedaemonians in 382 turned their attention to the Chalcidian League in the north. Various towns on the Chal-cidice had by this time joined forces in a league-state with a common citizenship. According to Xenophon, ambassadors from two cities on the Chalcidice, Acanthus and Apollonia, in 382 arrived in Sparta to protest against their forced inclusion in the Chalcidian League. They claimed that all they wished was to live by their own laws and to have their own citizenship to themselves (Xen. Hell. V 2,11-19). The Lacedaemonian assembly voted to send an army to disband the Chalcidian League owing to its alleged violation of other cities’ autonomy. Over the next two years the Lacedaemonians fought against the Chalcidians and compelled the temporary dissolution of the league (Xen. Hell. V 2,20-21; 2,37-3,9; and 3,18-26). (By the mid-370s it had re-established itself - Harding, Nr. 35).
From one perspective the Lacedaemonians’ actions both at Mantinea and on the Chalcidice just enforced the letter of the autonomy clause in the King’s Peace. From another perspective the Lacedaemonians violated that same Peace’s spirit. Thus Diodorus, following Ephorus, writes: “the Lacedaemonians decided to make war against Mantinea, paying no heed to the existing treaties [i. e., the King’s Peace]” (XV 5,1). Isocrates says that the Lacedaemonians “sacked Mantinea even though Peace had already been established” (IV 126).
What allowed the Lacedaemonians to get away with all this? When the Lacedaemonians attacked Mantinea, other Greeks expressed outrage, but when it came to doing something, they all, like Athens (Diod. XV 5), looked the other way even though the more perspicacious in Greece surely realized that, given how the Lacedaemonians were acting, it might be their turn next.
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