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DELIBES—DELILLE

few barbarian chiefs, took from the league all its Thracian and Macedonian cities (Abdera, Maronea, Neapolis, Methone.) In 352–351 Philip actually received help from former members of the confederacy. In 351 Charidemus, Chares and Phocion were sent to oppose him, and we find that the contributions of the Lesbian cities were assigned to them for supplies, but no successes were gained. In 349 Euboea and Olynthus were lost to the league, of which indeed nothing remained but an empty form, in spite of the facts that the expelled Olynthians appealed to it in 348 and that Mytilene rejoined in 347. In 346 the peace of Philocrates was made between the league and Philip on terms which were accepted by the Athenian Boulē. It is very remarkable that, in spite of the powerlessness of the confederacy, the last recorded event in its history is the steady loyalty of Tenedos, which gave money to Athens about 340 (Hicks and Hill, 146). The victory of Philip at Chaeronea in 338 finally destroyed the league.

In spite of the precautions taken by the allies to prevent the domination of Athens at their expense, the policy of the league was almost throughout directed rather in the interests of Athens. Founded with the specific object of thwarting the ambitious designs of Sparta, it was plunged by Athens into enterprises of an entirely different character which exhausted the resources of the allies without benefiting them in any respect. There is no doubt that, with very few exceptions, the cities were held to their allegiance solely by the superior force of the Athenian navy. The few instances of its action show that the Συνέδριον was practically only a tool in the hands of Athens.

Authorities.The First League.—The general histories of Greece, especially those of A. Holm (Eng. trans., London, 1894), G. Busolt (2nd ed., Gotha, 1893), J. Beloch (Strassburg, 1893 foll.), and G. Grote (the one-vol. ed. of 1907 has some further notes on later evidence). E. Meyer’s Gesch. des Altertums (Stuttgart, 1892 foll.) and Forschungen (Halle, 1892 foll.) are of the greatest value. For inscriptions, G. F. Hill, Sources of Greek History, 478–431 (2nd ed., 1907); E. L. Hicks and G. F. Hill, Greek Hist. Inscr. (Oxford, 1901). On the tribute see also U. Köhler in Abhandlungen d. Berliner Akademie (1869) and U. Pedroli, “I Tributi degli alleati d’ Atene” in Beloch’s Studi di storia antica. See also articles Aristides; Themistocles; Pericles; Cimon, &c., and Greece: History, with works quoted. For the last years of the league see also Peloponnesian War.

The Second League.—The chief modern works are G. Busolt, “Der zweite athenische Bund” in Neue Jahrbücher für classische Philologie (supp. vol. vii., 1873–1875, pp. 641-866), and F. H. Marshall, The Second Athenian Confederacy (1905), one of the Cambridge Historical Essays (No. xiii.). The latter is based on Busolt’s monograph and includes subsequent epigraphic evidence, with a full list of authorities. For inscriptions see Hicks and Hill, op. cit., and the Inscriptiones Atticae, vol. ii. pt. 5. The meagre data given by ancient writers are collected by Busolt and Marshall.  (J. M. M.) 


DELIBES, CLÉMENT PHILIBERT LÉO (1836–1891), French composer, was born at Saint Germain du Val on the 21st of February 1836. He studied at the Paris Conservatoire under Adolphe Charles Adam, through whose influence he became accompanist at the Théâtre Lyrique. His first essay in dramatic composition was his Deux sous de charbon (1853), and during several years he produced a number of operettas. His cantata Alger was heard at the Paris opera in 1865. Having become second chorus master at the Grand Opéra, he wrote the music of a ballet entitled La Source for this theatre, in collaboration with Minkous, a Polish composer. La Source was produced with great success in 1866. The composer returned to the operetta style with Malbrouk s’en va-t-en guerre,—written in collaboration with Georges Bizet, Émile Jonas and Legouix, and given at the Théâtre de l’Athénée in 1867. Two years later came L’Écossais de Chatou, a one-act piece, and La Cour du roi Pétaud, a three-act opera-bouffe. The ballet Coppélia was produced at the Grand Opéra on the 25th of May 1870 with enormous success.

Delibes gave up his post as second chorus master at the Grand Opéra in 1872 when he married the daughter of Mademoiselle Denain, formerly an actress at the Comédie Française. In this year he published a collection of graceful melodies including Myrto, Les Filles de Cadiz, Bonjour, Suzon and others. His first important dramatic work was Le Roi l’a dit, a charming comic opera, produced on the 24th of May 1873 at the Opéra Comique. Three years later, on the 14th of June 1876, Sylvia, a ballet in three acts, one of the composer’s most delightful works, was produced at the Grand Opéra. This was followed by La Mort d’Orphée, a grand scena produced at the Trocadéro concerts in 1878; by Jean de Nivelle, a three-act opera brought out at the Opéra Comique on the 8th of March 1880; and by Lakmé, an opera in three acts produced at the same theatre on the 14th of April 1883. Lakmé has remained his most popular opera. The composer died in Paris on the 16th of January 1891, leaving Kassya, a four-act opera, in an unfinished state. This work was completed by E. Guiraud, and produced at the Opéra Comique on the 21st of March 1893. In 1877 Delibes became a chevalier of the Legion of Honour; in 1881 he became a professor of advanced composition at the Conservatoire; in 1884 he took the place of Victor Massé at the Institut de France.

Leo Delibes was a typically French composer. His music is light, graceful and refined. He excelled in ballet music, and Sylvia may well be considered a masterpiece. His operas are constructed on a conventional pattern. The harmonic texture, however, is modern, and the melodic invention abundant, while the orchestral treatment is invariably excellent.


DELILAH, in the Bible, the heroine of Samson’s last love-story and the cause of his downfall (Judg. xvi.). She was a Philistine of Sorek (mod. Sūrīk), west of Zorah, and when her countrymen offered her an enormous bribe to betray him, she set to work to find out the source of his strength. Thrice Samson scoffingly told her how he might be bound, and thrice he readily broke the bonds with which she had fettered him in his sleep; seven green bow-strings, new ropes, and even the braiding of his hair into the frame of the loom failed to secure him. At length he disclosed the secret of his power. Delilah put him to sleep upon her lap, called in a man to shave off his seven locks, and this time he was easily captured. See Samson.


DELILLE, JACQUES (1738–1813), French poet, was born on the 22nd of June 1738 at Aigue-Perse in Auvergne. He was an illegitimate child, and was descended by his mother from the chancellor De l’Hôpital. He was educated at the college of Lisieux in Paris and became an elementary teacher. He gradually acquired a reputation as a poet by his epistles, in which things are not called by their ordinary names but are hinted at by elaborate periphrases. Sugar becomes “le miel américain que du suc des roseaux exprima l’Africain.” The publication (1769) of his translation of the Georgics of Virgil made him famous. Voltaire recommended the poet for the next vacant place in the Academy. He was at once elected a member, but was not admitted until 1774 owing to the opposition of the king, who alleged that he was too young. In his Jardins, ou l’art d’embellir les paysages (1782) he made good his pretensions as an original poet. In 1786 he made a journey to Constantinople in the train of the ambassador M. de Choiseul-Gouffier.

Delille had become professor of Latin poetry at the Collège da France, and abbot of Saint-Sévérin, when the outbreak of the Revolution reduced him to poverty. He purchased his personal safety by professing his adherence to revolutionary doctrine, but eventually quitted Paris, and retired to St Dié, where he completed his translation of the Aeneid. He emigrated first to Basel and then to Glairesse in Switzerland. Here he finished his Homme des champs, and his poem on the Trois règnes de la nature. His next place of refuge was in Germany, where he composed his La Pitié; and finally, he passed some time in London, chiefly employed in translating Paradise Lost. In 1802 he was able to return to Paris, where, although nearly blind, he resumed his professorship and his chair at the Academy, but lived in retirement. He fortunately did not outlive the vogue of the descriptive poems which were his special province, and died on the 1st of May 1813.

Delille left behind him little prose. His preface to the translation of the Georgics is an able essay, and contains many excellent hints on the art and difficulties of translation. He wrote the article “La Bruyère” in the Biographie universelle. The following is the list of his poetical works:—Les Géorgiques de Virgile, traduites en vers français (Paris, 1769, 1782, 1785, 1809); Les Jardins, en quatre chants (1780; new edition, Paris, 1801);