Book 1
For the return of the Greeks from Troy, having taken place so late, caused many revolutions; and factions, generally speaking, arose in the states; in consequence of which men were expelled, and founded cities.
For those who are now called Boeotians, being driven out of Arne by the Thessalians in the sixtieth year after the taking of Troy, settled in what is now called Boeotia, but was before called the Cadmean country. (Though there was a division of them in this country before, some of whom also joined the expedition against Troy.) And the Dorians in the eightieth year took possession of the Peloponnese with the Heraclidae.
And Greece having with difficulty, after a long time, enjoyed settled peace, and being no longer subject to migrations, began to send out colonies; and the Athenians colonized Ionia, and most of the islands; and the Peloponnesians, the greater part of Italy and Sicily, and some places in the rest of Greece. The term Greece is here used in its widest sense, as including all countries that had a Greek population. But all these places were founded after the Trojan war.
Now when Greece was becoming more powerful, and acquiring possession of money still more than before, tyrannies, generally speaking, were established in the cities, from the revenues becoming greater; whereas before there had been hereditary kingly governments with definite privileges; and Greece began to fit out navies, and they paid more attention to the sea.
Now the Corinthians are said first to have managed naval matters most nearly to the present fashion, and triremes to have been built at Corinth first in Greece.
And Aminocles, a Corinthian shipwright, appears to have built four ships for the Samians also. Now it is about three hundred years to the end of this war from the time that Aminocles went to the Samians;
and the most ancient sea-fight with which we are acquainted was fought between the Corinthians and the Corcyraeans. And from that too it is about two hundred and sixty years to the same period.
For the Corinthians, having their city situated on the isthmus, had always possessed an emporium; as the Greeks of old, both those within the Peloponnese and those without, had intercourse with each other by land more than by sea, through their country: and they were very rich, as is shown even by the old poets; for they gave the title of wealthy to the place. And when the Greeks began to make more voyages, having got their slips they put down piracy; and rendered their city rich in income of money, as they afforded an emporium both ways.
And the Ionians afterwards had a large navy in the time of Cyrus, the first king of the Persians, and Cambyses his son; and while at war with Cyrus, commanded the sea along their coast for some time. Polycrates also, tyrant of Samos, in the time of Cambyses, having a strong fleet, both made some other of the islands subject to him, and took Rhenea and dedicated it to the Delian Apollo. And the Phocaeans, while founding Massalia, conquered the Carthaginians in a sea-fight.
These were the strongest of their navies. But even these, though many generations after the Trojan war, appear to have used but few triremes, and to have been still fitted out with fifty-oared vessels, and long boats, as that fleet was.
And it was but a short time before the Median war, and the death of Darius, who was king of the Persians after Cambyses, that triremes were possessed in any number by the tyrants of Sicily and the Corcyraeans. For these were the last navies worth mentioning established in Greece before the expedition of Xerxes:
as the Aeginetans and Athenians, and whoever else had any, possessed but small ones, and of those the greater part fifty-oared vessels; and it was only lately that Themistocles persuaded the Athenians, when at war with the aeginetans, and when the barbarian was also expected, to build those very ships with which they fought him by sea; and these were not yet decked throughout.
Of such a [deficient] character then were the navies of the Greeks, both the ancient ones and those which were built afterwards. And yet those who paid attention to them obtained the greatest power, both by income of money and dominion over others: for they sailed against the islands, and subdued them; especially those who had not sufficient extent of country.
But as for war by land, from which any power From the position of the καὶ here, it seems intended only to make the following word more emphatic; as it is often used, before verbs especially; in instance of which occurs in the very next sentence, ὅσοι καὶ ἐγένοντο. was acquired, there was none. Such as did arise, were all against their several neighbours; and the Greeks did not go out in any foreign expeditions far from their country for the subjugation of others. For they had not ranged themselves with the chief states as subjects; nor, on the other hand, did they of their own accord, on fair and equal terms, make common expeditions; but it was rather neighbouring states that separately waged war upon each other.
But it was for the war carried on at an early period between the Chalcidians and Eretrians, that the rest of Greece also was most generally divided in alliance with one side or the other.
Now to others there arose in other ways obstacles to their increase; and in the case of the Ionians, when their power had advanced to a high pitch, Cyrus and the Persian kingdom, having subdued Croesus and all within the Halys to the sea, marched against them, and reduced to bondage their cities on the mainland, as Darius afterwards did even the islands, conquering them by means of the fleet of the Phoenicians.
As for the tyrants, such as there were in the Grecian cities, since they provided only for what concerned themselves, with a view to the safety of their own persons, and the aggrandizement of their own family, they governed their cities with caution, as far as they possibly could; and nothing memorable was achieved by them; [indeed nothing,] except it might be against their own several border states. [I speak of those in old Greece,] for those in Sicily advanced to a very great degree of power. Thus on all sides Greece for a long time was kept in check; so that it both performed nothing illustrious in common, and was less daring as regards individual states.
But after the tyrants of the Athenians and those in the rest of Greece, (which even at an earlier period i. e. than the Athenians. was for a long time subject to tyrants,) the most and last, excepting those in Sicily, had been deposed by the Lacedaemonians; (for Lacedaemon, after the settlement of the Dorians who now inhabit it, though torn by factions for the longest time of any country that we are acquainted with, yet from the earliest period enjoyed good laws, and was always free from tyrants; for it is about four hundred years, or a little more, to the end of this war, that the Lacedaemonians have been in possession of the same form of government; and being for this reason powerful, they settled matters in the other states also;) after, A common force of δέ after a long parenthesis. I say, the deposition of the tyrants in the rest of Greece, not many years subsequently the battle of Marathon was fought between the Medes and Athenians.
And in the tenth year after it, the barbarians came again with the great armament against Greece to enslave it. And when great danger was impending, the Lacedaemonians took the lead of the confederate Greeks, as being the most powerful; and the Athenians, on the approach of the Medes, determined to leave their city, and having broken up their establishments, Or, having removed their furniture, the word meaning, just there verse of κατασκευάζομαι. Bloomfield connects it with ἐς τὰς ναῦς. went on board their slips, and became a naval people. And having together repulsed the barbarian, no long time after, both those Greeks who had revolted from the king, and those who had joined in the war [against him], were divided between the Athenians and Lacedaemonians. For these states respectively appeared the most powerful; for the one was strong by land, and the other by sea.
And for a short time the confederacy held together; but afterwards the Lacedaemonians and Athenians, having quarrelled, waged war against each other with their allies: and of the rest of the Greeks, whoever in any quarter were at variance, now betook themselves to these. So that, from the Persian war all the time to this, making peace at one time, and at another war, either with each other or with their own revolting allies, they prepared themselves well in military matters, and became more experienced from going through their training in scenes of danger. Their field of exercise was not the parade, but the field of battle. —Arnold.
Now the Lacedaemonians did not treat The full force of the Greek could not I think be expressed here, (or in the next chapter, τύραννον ὄντα ἀποθανεῖν,) without this change of the participle into the verb, the original verb of the sentence following in a subordinate clause. This is by no means an uncommon construction, and Kühner might have added more numerous, and perhaps more apposite examples to the single one by which he illustrates it, viz. Soph. El. 345, ἐλοῦ γε θάτερ᾽,ἢ φρονεῖν κακῶς, ἢ τῶν φίλων φρονοῦσα μὴ μνήμην ἔχειν, i. e. ἦ τῶν φίλων μὴ μνήμην ἔχουσα (εὖ) φρονεῖνHis rule is as follows: Although the Greeks make great use of the participle to express the accidental accompaniments of an action, and thus distinguish it from that action itself, yet this is sometimes reversed; the principal action is expressed in the participle as a mere accompaniment, while the accompaniment assumes the character of the principal verb of the sentence. Gr. Gr. Jelf. 705. 2. In Matthiae there is not any notice of the construction that I am aware of. The same participle, ἔχοντες, is used in precisely a similar manner, chap. 144, τὰς δὲ πόλεις ὅτι αὐτονόμους ἀφήσομεν, εἰ καὶ αὐτονόμους ἔχοντες ἐσπεισάμεθα: if we treated them as independent when we made the treaty and by Xenophon, Anab. I. 8. 22. καὶ πάντες δὲ οἱ τῶν βαρβάρων ἄρχοντες μέσου ἔχοντες τὸ αὑτῶν ἡγοῦντο: occupied the centre—when they led them on. as tributaries the allies whom they led, but only took care that they should be governed by an oligarchy, in accordance with their own interest; whereas the Athenians had in course of time taken ships from the states [in their league,] except the Chians and Lesbians, and had commanded all to pay a tribute in money. And their own separate resources for this war were greater than when before they had been in their fullest bloom with their entire alliance.
Such then I found to be the early state of things, though it is difficult to trust every proof of it in succession. For men receive alike without examination from each other the reports of past events, even though they may have happened in their own country.
For instance, the mass of the Athenians think that Hipparchus was tyrant when he was slain by Harmodius and Aristogiton; and do not know that Hippias held the government as being the eldest of the sons of Pisistratus, and Hipparchus and Thessalus were his brothers. But Harmodius and Aristogiton having suspected that on that day, and at the very moment, some information had been given to Hippias by their accomplices, abstained from attacking him, as being fore-warned; but as they wished before they were seized to do something even at all hazards, having fallen in with Hipparchus near the Leocorium, as it is called, while arranging the Panathenaic procession, they slew him.
And there are many other things also, even at the present day, and not such as are thrown into oblivion by time, of which the rest of the Greeks too have not correct notions; as, that the kings of the Lacedaemonians do not vote with one vote each, but with two; and that they have a Pitanensian Lochus; which never yet existed. With so little pains is the investigation of truth pursued by most men; and they rather turn to views already formed.
If, however, from the proofs which have been mentioned any one should suppose that things were, on the whole, such as I have described them; instead of rather believing what either poets have sung of them, setting them off in terms of exaggeration, or historians have composed, in language more attractive Literally, for listening to; in reference to the public recitation which in ancient times was the ordinary mode of publishing works of literature. to the ear than truthful, their subjects admitting of no proof, and most of them, through length of time, Literally, having won their way to the fabulous. having come to be regarded as fabulous—and if he should consider that, allowing for their antiquity, they have been sufficiently ascertained from the most certain data; he would not be mistaken in his opinion.
And though men always think the war of their own times to be the greatest while they are engaged in it, but when they have ceased from it, regard earlier events with more admiration; yet, to such as look at it from the facts themselves, this war will evidently appear to be greater than those.
And as for what they severally advanced in speaking, either when about to go to war, or when already in it, it was hard to remember the exact words of what was said; both for myself, with regard to what I heard in person, and for those who reported it to me from any other quarters: but as I thought that they would severally have spoken most to the purpose on the subjects from time to time before them, while I adhered as closely as possible to the general sense of what was really said so have I recorded it.
But with regard to the facts of what was done in the war, I did not presume to state them on hearsay from any chance informant, nor as I thought probable myself; but those at which I was personally present, and, when informed by others, only after investigating them accurately in every particular, as far as was possible.
And it was with labour that they were ascertained; because those who were present in the several affairs did not give the same account of the same things, but as each was well inclined to either party, or remembered [the circumstances.] Now, for hearing it recited, perhaps the unfabulous character of my work will appear less agreeable:
but as many as shall wish to see the truth of what both has happened, and will hereafter happen again, according to human nature—the same or pretty nearly so—for such to think it useful will be sufficient. And it is composed as a possession for ever, rather than as a prizetask to listen to at the present moment.
Now of former achievements, the greatest that was performed was the Median; and yet that had its decision quickly, in two battles by sea and two by land. But of this war both the duration was very long, and sufferings befell Greece in the course of it, such as were never matched in the same time.
For neither were so many cities ever taken and laid desolate, some by barbarians, and some by the parties themselves opposed in the war; (some, too, changed their inhabitants when taken;) nor was there so much banishing of men and bloodshed, partly in the war itself, and partly through sedition.
And things which before were spoken of from hearsay, but scantily confirmed by fact, were rendered not incredible; both about earthquakes, which at once extended over the greatest part of the world, and most violent at the same time; and eclipses of the sun, which happened more frequently than was on record of former times; and great droughts in some parts, and from them famines also; and what hurt them most, and destroyed a considerable part—the plague. For all these things fell upon them at once along with this war:
which the Athenians and Peloponnesians began by breaking the thirty years' truce after the taking of Euboea.
As for the reason why they broke it, I have first narrated their grounds of complaint and their differences, that no one might ever have to inquire from what origin so great a war broke out amongst the Greeks. For the truest reason, though least brought forward in words, I consider to have been, that the Athenians, by becoming great, and causing alarm to the Lacedaemonians, compelled them to proceed to hostilities.
But the following were the grounds of complaints openly alleged on either side, from which they broke the truce, and set to the war.
Epidamnuis is a, city situated on the right hand as you sail into the Ionian Gulf; bordering upon it, are the Taulantii, a barbarian people of Illyria.
It was planted by the Corcyraeans, but the leader of the colony was one Phalius, the son of Heratoclidas, a Corinthian of the lineage of Hercules who, The conjunction δή in this and similar passages merely serves to call for the reader's attention. In compliance, you must know, with the ancient custom. —Arnold. according to the ancient custom, was invited for this object from the mother city.
There were also some of the Corinthians, and of the rest of the Doric nation, who joined in the colony.
In process of time, the city of Epidamnus became great and populous; but having for many years together, as is reported, been torn by factions arising from a war made upon them by the neighboring barbarians, they were brought low, and deprived of the greatest part of their power.