Timoleon

Family: Corinthian · Role: general · First appears: Timoleon

Timoleon was born at Corinth to Timodemus and Demariste, both of high rank, and had an elder brother, Timophanes, who was unlike him. He often helped conceal or excuse Timophanes’s errors, but when his brother declared himself tyrant of Corinth, Timoleon withdrew weeping while conspirators killed him. This was later called “a truly heroic action”; Timoleon then grieved over the deed and, according to the comparison with Aemilius Paulus, avoided public places for twenty years.

The Corinthians unanimously elected Timoleon general of the expedition to assist Syracuse. He escaped the Carthaginian fleet, reached Tauromenium, and was welcomed by Andromachus. Within fifty days of landing, Dionysius surrendered the citadel of Syracuse and was sent into exile at Corinth; Timoleon then captured the city, demolished the tyrants’ fortifications, and established courts of justice. He defeated the Carthaginians at the river Crimesus with Demaretus, later took Hicetes and his son Eupolemus, who were executed as tyrants and traitors, overcame Mamercus, and received the surrender of Leptines.

After freeing Sicily from its usurping tyrants, Timoleon helped provide secure settlements for its people and was honored as a founder, while Megellus and Pheristus repopulated Agrigentum and Gela. In old age he accepted a house and country estate from the Syracusans, became blind, and died after a slight illness; Syracuse honored him with a magnificent public funeral.