From the siege of Phyle, during the winter of 404, until the ascent of the Acropolis in the fall of the following year, several fighting communities had succeeded one another under Thrasybulus’ direction, reconstituting little by little, as if in ripples, the whole of the Athenian community. The city’s mantle – to refer to the Platonic image again – was, however, far from being unified and homogeneous at the end of the civil war. Torn and patched back together, its seams were visible, and the political life of the initial years of the fourth century made them periodically reappear. The memory of these events reflected these struggles: In the aftermath of the civil war, various accounts coexisted and contradicted each other, before being replaced, during the fourth century, by a univocal civic account. There is every reason to believe that Thrasybulus tried, in the aftermath of the democratic restoration in 403, to put the memory of his epic journey on public display. However, just as he did not succeed in imposing himself durably in public life after 403. Thrasybulus lost the battle of history and memory by failing to impose his own account of the events in Athens – and this is most certainly what ultimately explains why he got left out of ancient sources.

This chapter examines Xenophon’s portrayal of the Athenian elite in the opening books of the Hellenica. His presentation of the Arginusae episode (406 BC), in which the Athenian dēmos executed six of its generals without trial, focuses not so much on the behavior of the dēmos as on the essential role of elite Athenians in advising the dēmos. Despite his attraction to oligarchy as an alternative to democracy, Xenophon presents a dark picture of the regime of the Thirty and its rapid descent into violence and lawlessness and hails the restoration of the democracy as a return to normalcy and harmony. This episode is key to understanding Xenophon’s political perspective: the manifest failure of the city’s elite to offer a reasonable alternative to democracy means that for Xenophon the central political question for elite Athenians of his time is not how to overthrow the city’s democratic constitution but how to provide the democracy with the leadership it needs to succeed. Xenophon’s portrayal of several elite Athenian leaders in the opening books of the Hellenica provides some important indications of what Xenophon regards as capable and responsible elite leadership.