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Sicyon was built on a low
triangular plateau west of Corinth and about two miles from the Corinthian
Gulf. Between the city and its port lay a fertile plain with olive groves and
orchards. In Mycenean times Sicyon had been ruled by a line of twenty-six
mythical kings and then seven priests of Apollo. The king-list given by
Pausanias comprises twenty-four kings, beginning with the autochthonous
Aegialeus. The penultimate king of the list, Agamemnon, compels the submission
of Sicyon to Mycenae; after him comes the Dorian usurper Phalces. Pausanias
shares his source with Castor of Rhodes, who used the king-list in compiling
tables of history. During the Persian Wars, the Sicyonians participated with
fifteen triremes in the Battle of Salamis and with
3,000 hoplites in the Battle of
Plataea. On the
Delphic Serpent Column celebrating the victory Sicyon was named in fifth place
after Sparta, Athens, Corinth and Tegea. In September 479 a Sicyonian
contingent fought bravely in the Battle of
Mycale, where they
lost more men than any other city. Later in the 5th century, Sicyon, like
Corinth, suffered from the commercial rivalry of Athens in the western seas,
and was repeatedly harassed by squadrons of Athenian ships. The Sicyonians
fought two battles against the Athenians, first against their admiral
Tolmides in 455 and then
in a land battle against
Pericles with 1000 hoplites in 453. In the
Peloponnesian War
Sicyon followed the lead of Sparta and Corinth. When these two powers
quarrelled during the peace of Nicias, it remained loyal to the Spartans. At
the reprise of the war, during the Athenian expedition in Sicily, the
Sicyonians contributed 200 pressed hoplites under their commander Sargeus to
the force that relieved Syracuse. At the beginning of the 4th century, in the Corinthian war, Sicyon
sided again with Sparta and became its base of operations against the allied
troops round Corinth. In 369 Sicyon was captured and garrisoned by the Thebans
in their successful attack on the Peloponnesian League. From 368 to 366 Sicyon
was ruled by Euphron who first favoured democracy, but then made himself
tyrant. Euphron was killed in Thebes by a group af Sicyonian aristocrats, but
his compatriots buried him in his home town and continued to honour him like
the second founder of the city.
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