CALLIAS

callias, tyrant of chalcis in euboea. with the assistance of philip ii. of macedon, which he hoped to obtain, he contemplated the subjugation of the whole island. but finding that philip was unwilling to help him, callias had recourse to the athenians, although he had previously (350 b.c.) been engaged in hostilities with them. with the support of demosthenes, he was enabled to conclude an alliance with athens, and the tribute formerly paid by eretria and oreus to athens was handed over to him. but his plan of uniting the whole of euboea under his rule, with chalcis as capital, was frustrated by philip, who set up tyrants chosen by himself at eretria and oreus. subsequently, when philip's attention was engaged upon thrace, the athenians in conjunction with callias drove out these tyrants, and callias thus became master of the island (demosthenes, _de pace_, p. 58; _epistola philippi_, p. 159; diod. sic. xvi. 74). at the end of his life he appears to have lived at athens, and demosthenes proposed to confer the citizenship upon him (aeschines, _contra ctesiphontem_, 85, 87). callias and hipponicus, two names borne alternately by the heads of a wealthy and distinguished athenian family. during the 5th and 4th centuries b.c. the office of _daduchus_ or torch-bearer at the eleusinian mysteries was the hereditary privilege of the family till its extinction. the following members deserve mention. 1. callias, the second of the name, fought at the battle of marathon (490) in priestly attire. some time after the death of cimon, probably about 445 b.c., he was sent to susa to conclude with artaxerxes, king of persia, a treaty of peace afterwards misnamed the "peace of cimon." cimon had nothing to do with it, and he was totally opposed to the idea of peace with persia (see cimon). at all events callias's mission does not seem to have been successful; he was indicted for high treason on his return to athens and sentenced to a fine of fifty talents. see herodotus vii. 151; diod. sic. xii. 4; demosthenes, _de falsa legatione_, p. 428; grote recognizes the treaty as a historical fact, _history of greece_, ch. xlv., while curtius, bk. iii. ch. ii., denies the conclusion of any formal treaty; see also ed. meyer, _forschungen_, ii.; j.b. bury in _hermathena_, xxiv. (1898). 2. hipponicus, son of the above. together with eurymedon he commanded the athenian forces in the incursion into boeotian territory (426 b.c.) and was slain at the battle of delium (424). his wife, whom he divorced, subsequently became the wife of pericles; one of his daughters, hipparete, married alcibiades; another, the wife of theodorus, was the mother of the orator isocrates. see thucydides iii. 91; diod. sic. xii. 65; andocides, _contra alcibiadem_, 13. 3. callias, son of the above, the black sheep of the family, was notorious for his profligacy and extravagance, and was ridiculed by the comic poets as an example of a degenerate athenian (aristophanes, _frogs_, 429, _birds_, 283, and schol. andocides, _de mysteriis_, 110-131). the scene of xenophon's _symposium_ and plato's _protagoras_ was laid at his house. he was reduced to a state of absolute poverty and, according to aelian (_var. hist._ iv. 23), committed suicide, but there is no confirmation of this. in spite of his dissipated life he played a certain part in public affairs. in 392 he was in command of the athenian hoplites at corinth, when the spartans were defeated by iphicrates. in 371 he was at the head of the embassy sent to make terms with sparta. the peace which was the result was called after him the "peace of callias." see xenophon, _hellenica_, iv. 5, vi. 3; and delian league.