Thrasybulus

Thrasybulus led seventy men out of exile and restored the Athenian democracy. An Athenian of the deme Steiria, he commanded a trireme in the fleet at Samos in 411 BC when an oligarchic coup took over the city, and he and Thrasyllus led the fleet's refusal to accept it — keeping the democracy alive aboard the ships while it had been abolished at home. He recalled Alcibiades from exile and served under him at Cyzicus and Arginusae. Athens lost the war in 404 BC, and Sparta installed thirty men to govern it. The Thirty Tyrants killed something like 1,500 people in eight months, confiscated estates, expelled most of the citizen body from the city, and made a point of implicating the wealthy in the killings so that they could not stand apart. Thrasybulus was exiled and went to Thebes, which sheltered him against Spartan orders. In the winter of 404 he crossed the border with about seventy men and seized the fort of Phyle on Mount Parnes. Snow held off the first attack; his numbers grew to several hundred; and he marched to Piraeus and beat the oligarchs at Munychia, where Critias was killed. Sparta sent Pausanias, who negotiated rather than crushed him. His decisive act came afterwards. He proposed and carried an amnesty covering everyone but the Thirty themselves, and it held — Athenians were forbidden to prosecute for anything done before it. It is the first recorded amnesty in history. He was killed on campaign in 388 BC. Socrates was tried and executed under the restored democracy four years later, which the amnesty did not prevent because the charge was framed as impiety.

• Lived: 440 BCE – 388 BCE
• Nationality: Greek
• Roles: general, ruler