Menon of Thessaly

For other Menons or Menos see Meno (disambiguation)

"Menon" (423?-400BC), son of Alexidemus, was a Thessalian, probably from Pharsalus [Diodorus incorrectly identifies him as from Larissa (Bigwood, "Ancient Accounts of the Battle of Cunaxa" p 350 fn 45)] and is famous for appearing in Plato's dialogue the Meno and for being among the generals killed by Artaxerxes after the Battle of Cunaxa as detailed in Xenophon's Anabasis.

Biography

Menon is reported, by both Xenophon and Plato, to have been attractive and in the bloom of youth and was quite young at his death. He had many lovers, including Aristippus of Larissa, Tharypas, and Ariaeus the Persian. Xenophon gives a strongly hostile description of Menon as a disreputable, ambitious and dishonest youth, willing to commit any injustice for advancement, [Xenophon, Anabasis, II.6.21-27] though Menon's actions in the Anabasis may not entirely merit such a negative portrait. [Cf. Brown "Menon of Thessaly" p 401]

Menon, while still young is given command of 1000 hoplites and five hundred peltasts [Xenophon, Anabasis, I.2.6] from Thessaly as hired by Aristippus [ibid II.6.28] to assist Cyrus the Younger in his attempt to seize the Persian throne from his brother Artaxerxes. Artaxerxes was made king of Persia upon the death of Darius II, but Cyrus believed that he had a more rightful claim to the throne and gathered an army to contend his kingship. Cyrus gathered together Persian supporters and Greek mercenaries, including Xenophon himself. Cyrus at first deceived the Greeks about the purpose of his mission and led them some considerable way, to the Euphrates River at Thapsacus, before telling them his true intentions.

Xenophon goes into some detail about the march and mentions Menon on a few occasions. Menon escorted, with some of his troops, the Cilician queen back to Cilicia. [ibid I.2.20] . Menon lost some hundred troops on this mission, either because his troops were caught pillaging and killed by the Cilicians or because they got lost and wandered until they perished. [ibid, I.2.25] Later, after Cyrus first told the Greeks that he was leading them into battle against Artaxerxes to seize the Persian throne, the Greeks were dismayed and demanded more money before they would continue. Menon won the admiration of Cyrus by persuading his troops to cross the Euphrates first (as a show of their willingness to follow Cyrus) before the other troops had decided. [ibid, I.4.11-17] At another point, Menon's soldiers became enraged with Clearchus, the Spartan general, unsuccessfully trying to stone him to death, an act which nearly led to Menon's and Clearchus men openly battling between them. [ibid, I.5.11-13] This story, along with his loss of 100 men in Cilicia, suggests that Menon maintained poor discipline among his troops. Xenophon claims that Menon maintained discipline by participating in his troops wrongdoings. [ibid, II.6.27]

Cyrus eventually engaged with Artaxerxes' troops headed by Tissaphernes at the Battle of Cunaxa. The Greek contingent won easily, but Cyrus and his troops were repulsed and Cyrus himself was killed in battle. The Greek troops, now led by Clearchus, viewing themselves as the victors, declared their support for Ariaeus, one of Cyrus' commanders, the most senior Persian on their side still living. Ariaeus accompanied by Menon, his "guest-friend," met privately with Tissaphernes. Ctesias tells us that Tissaphernes here began to plot to betray the Greeks with Menon, [Ctesias Fr. 27, Photius' summary of Ctesias' Persica §68] . And Xenophon writes that Clearchus believed that Menon had been pouring false slander about the Greeks into Tissaphernes' ear and was aware that Menon was plotting to seize control of the army from Clearchus with Tissaphernes's favor. [Xenophon, Anabasis, II.5.28] Sherylee Bassett suggests that Tissaphernes may have been here deceiving Menon into thinking he would support his leadership aspirations, playing the two main leaders, Clearchus and Menon, off against each other. ["Innocent Victims or Perjurers Betrayed?" p 454] Ariaeus declined the offer of kingship and Tissaphernes began apparently friendly negotiations with Clearchus for a truce, finally inviting him for a cordial meeting with the other Greek generals and officers. According to Ctesias, some of the Greek soldiers were hesitant to attend the meeting, but Menon persuaded the soldiers, who thereby persuaded the reluctant Clearchus, to comply. [Since Ctesias couldn't have been present at these events, his source would have been Clearchus, who he attended before his beheading. It's possible that Clearchus could have falsely portrayed himself as cautious and Menon as an active deceiver to Ctesias.] Clearchus, with four other generals (Agis of Arcadia, Socrates of Achaea, Proxenus of Boetia and Menon), twenty officers and some two hundred troops visited the tent of Tissaphernes but they were betrayed, Clearchus and the generals being captured and all of the officers and as many of the soldiers as could be caught being killed. The generals were taken to Artaxerxes and all were beheaded, except Menon.

Ctesias' account simply tells us, at this point, that Menon was spared [Fr. 27, Photius' summary of Ctesias' Persica §69] . Diodorus says Menon was spared since he alone was thought willing to betray the Greeks. According to Xenophon, Menon was kept alive and tortured for a year before finally being killed. [Anabasis, II.6.29] Ctesias is generally an overall unreliable historian, but since he was at the time a physician to Artaxerxes and was witness to some of the events (for example, attending to Clearchus before he was beheaded), he may be considered more reliable than Xenophon, who, as he himself admits, is merely repeating a report that he heard. On the other hand, the two reports need not necessarily differ, if Ctesias only knew of Menon being spared and was not aware that he was subsequently tortured and ultimately killed. [cf also Brown "Menon of Thessaly" pp 401-402 & Bigwood, "Ancient Accounts of the Battle of Cunaxa" p 356.]

Menon in Plato

Menon appears in Plato's dialogue Meno as a guest of Anytus accompanied by a considerable retinue of slaves. [Plato, "Meno" 82a] Menon's stay in Athens is short and Socrates mentions that he is not able to stay to attend the mysteries. [ibid 76e] The dialogue is not historical, but is probably set in 402 BC shortly before Menon's Persian generalship [Nails, The People of Plato, p 204] or in 401 BC, while he is en route to Persia. [Hoerber, "Plato's 'Meno,'" p 78. Cf also Brown, "Menon of Thessaly" pp 399-400] Socrates says that Menon is a former student of Gorgias [Plato "Meno" 70b & 96d] and Menon notes that he has made many speeches on virtue before large audiences, [ibid 80b] suggesting an interest in sophistry. Socrates' comments also suggest that he is associated with the Greek eristic tradition of debate. [ibid 75d, 80e] Menon asks Socrates the question of whether virtue can be taught, but seems little interested in discovering the answer, but rather seeks a strong argument to use in debate and public speech. Xenophon had described Menon as being the complete opposite of virtuous and as believing that virtuous people were weak and ripe for being taken advantage of. [Anabasis, II.6.21-26] Socrates tries to lead Menon into the question of what virtue is, but Menon resists, asking Socrates to answer his initial question of whether virtue is teachable. [Plato, "Meno" 86c-d] The dialogue ends with the conclusion that virtue is not teachable, though without an conclusion on what virtue is.

Citations

Ancient Sources

Xenophon, Anabasis, I.2, I.4-5, I.7-8, II.1-2 & II.4-6

Ctesias, Photius' summary of Ctesias' Persica, §64 & §68-69

Plutarch Artaxerxes (the one mention of Menon is a quote from Ctesias)

Diodorus Siculus, Bibliotheca historica XIV.19.8 & XIV.27.2

Plato Meno

Other References

Bassett, Sherylee R. "Innocent Victims or Perjurers Betrayed? The Arrest of the Generals in Xenophon's 'Anabasis,'" The Classical Quarterly, New Series, 52: 2 (2002) pp 447-461
Bigwood, J. M. "The Ancient Accounts of the Battle of Cunaxa," The American Journal of Philology, 104:4 (Winter, 1983) pp 340-357
Brown, Truesdell S. "Menon of Thessaly" Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte, 35:4 (1986) pp 387-404
Hoerber, Robert G. "Plato's 'Meno,'" Phronesis, 5:2 (1960), pp 78-102
Nails, Debra, The People of Plato: A Prosopography of Plato and Other Socratics, (Hackett 2002) pp 204-205

External Links

[http://etext.library.adelaide.edu.au/x/xenophon/x5an/ Dakyns' translation of Xenophon's Anabasis]
[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0178&query=text%3DMeno%3A70a&chunk=text Plato's Meno at the Perseus Project]
[http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/1643 Plato's Meno at Gutenberg.org]
[http://www.livius.org/ct-cz/ctesias/ctesias_overview.html Fragments of Ctesias]
[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0084&layout=&loc=9.1.1 Diodorus' Bibliotheca historica]
[http://etext.library.adelaide.edu.au/p/plutarch/lives/chapter66.html Plutarch's Life of Artaxerxes]