Book 2
The war between the Athenians and Peloponnesians and their respective allies now begins from this period, at which they ceased from further intercourse with each other without a herald, and having once proceeded to hostilities, carried them on continuously; and the history of it is written in order, as the several events happened, by summers and winters.
For the thirty years' truce which was made after the reduction of Euboea lasted fourteen years; but in the fifteenth year, when Chrysis was in the forty-eighth year of her priesthood at Argos, and Aenesias was ephor at Sparta, and Pythodorus had still two months to be archon at Athens; in the sixth month after the battle at Potidaea, and in the beginning of spring, rather more than three hundred men of the Thebans, (led by Pythangelus, son of Phylidas, and Diemporus, son of Onetorides, Boeotarchs,) about the first Literally first sleep. watch entered with their arms into Plataea, a town of Boeotia, which was in alliance with the Athenians.
There were certain men of the Plataeans who called them in, and opened the gates to them, namely, Nauclides and his party, who wished, for the sake of their own power, to put to death those of the citizens who were opposed to them, and to put the city into the hands of the Thebans.
They carried on these negotiations through Eurymachus, the son of Leontiades, a very influential person at Thebes. For the Thebans, foreseeing that the war would take place, wished to surprise Plataea, which had always been at variance with them, while it was still time of peace, and the war had not openly broken out. And on this account, too, they entered the more easily without being observed, as no guard had been set before [the gates].
After piling their arms in the market-place, they did not comply with the wish of those who called them in by immediately setting to work, and going to the houses of their adversaries; but determined to make a proclamation in friendly terms, and to bring the city to an agreement rather, and to friendship; and the herald proclaimed, that whoever wished to make alliance according to the hereditary principles of all the Boeotians, should come and The Thebans, as usual on a halt, proceeded to pile their arms, and by Inviting the Plataeans to pile theirs with them, they meant that they should come in arms from their several houses to join them, and thus naturally pile their spears and shields with those of their friends, to be taken up together with theirs, whenever they should be required either to march or to fight —Arnold. See his whole note. pile his arms with them, supposing that the city would easily come over to them by this method.
The Plataeans, on finding that the Thebans were within their walls, and that their city was unexpectedly taken, being very much alarmed, and thinking that far more had entered than really had, (for they did not see them in the night,) came to an agreement, and having accepted the terms, remained quiet; especially since they were proceeding to no violent measures against any one.
But by some means or other while making these negotiations, they observed that the Thebans were not numerous, and thought that by attacking them they might easily overpower them; for it was not the wish of the great body of the Plataeans to revolt from the Athenians.
They determined therefore to make the attempt; and proceeded to join each other by digging through the partition-walls [of their houses], that they might not be seen going through the streets; and set waggons without the cattle in the streets, to serve for a barricade; and got every thing else ready, as each seemed likely to be of service for the business in hand.
When things were in readiness, as far as they could make them so, having watched for the time when it was still night and just about day-break, they began to go out of their houses against them; that The original is rendered obscure by the singular change in the subjects of the two verbs, προσφέρωνται and γιγνωνται; the former referring to the Plataeans, the latter to the Thebans. I have allowed myself a little more licence than usual in translating the passage, to avoid the awkwardness of a literal version. they might not attack them by day-light, when they would be more bold, and on equal terms with themselves, but in the night, when they would be more timid, and fight at a disadvantage through their own acquaintance with the city. So they assailed them immediately, and came to close quarters with them as quickly as they could.
The Thebans, on finding themselves outwitted, proceeded to close their ranks, and repel their attacks, wherever they might fall upon them.
And twice or thrice they beat them off; but afterwards, when the men were assailing them with a great clamour, and the women and slaves were raising a loud shouting and screaming from the houses, and pelting them with stones and tiles, and a violent rain also had come on in the night, they were frightened, and turned and fled through the city, the greater part of them, through the dark and dirt, (for the event happened at the end of the month,) being unacquainted with the ways out, by which they were to save themselves; while they had pursuers who were acquainted with them, τοῦ μὴ εκφέυγειν. Poppo observes that the infinitive does not express a purpose, as it does elsewhere, but a result. Arnold supposes that when thus added to sentences in the genitive case, it denotes properly neither an intended nor an unintended result, but simply a connexion, or belonging to, in the attached idea with respect to that which had preceded it. Having their pursuers well acquainted with the ways, which thing belonged to, or was connected with, their not escaping. to prevent their escaping: so that many were put to death.
Moreover, one of the Plataeans had shut the gate by which they had entered, and which was the only one opened, by driving the spike of a spear into the bar, instead of a The βάλανος was a sort of pin or bolt inserted into the bar, and going through it into the gates. When driven quite home, it could of course only be extracted by a key whose pipe exactly corresponded to it in size, so as to take a firm hold on it: and hence the key was called βαλανάγρα, or catch-bolt, from its catching and so drawing out the βάλανος. The effect of putting in this spike was exactly that of spiking a cannon; it could not again be extracted as there was no proper key to fit it. —Arnold. bolt; so that there was no longer any way out even by that.
As they were chased up and down the city, some of them mounted the wall and threw themselves over, and perished most of them: others came to a lone gate, and, a woman having given them an axe, cut through the bar without being observed, and went out, but in no great numbers, for it was quickly discovered; while others met their fate scattered about in different parts of the city.
But the largest and most united body of them rushed into a spacious building which joined on to the wall, and the near door of which happened to be open, thinking that the door of the building was a gate [of the city], and that there was a passage straight through to the outside.
When the Plataeans saw them cut off, they consulted whether they should burn them where they were, by setting fire to the building, or treat them in any other way.
At last, both those and all the rest of the Thebans that were yet alive, and wandering up and down the city, agreed to deliver up themselves and their arms to the Plataeans, to do with them as they pleased.
Thus then fared the party who were in Plataea.
The rest of the Thebans, who were to have joined them with all their forces while it was still night, in case those who had entered should be at all unsuccessful, on receiving on their march the tidings of what had happened, advanced to their succour.
Now Plataea is seventy stades distant from Thebes, and the rain which had fallen in the night made them proceed the slower; for the river Asopus was flowing with a full stream, and was not to be crossed easily.
So by marching through the rain, and having passed the river with difficulty, they arrived too late; as some of the men had been by this time slain, and others of them were kept alive as prisoners.
When the Thebans learned what had happened, they formed a design against those of the Plataeans who were outside the city, (for there were both men and stock in the fields, inasmuch as the evil had happened unexpectedly in time of peace,) for they wished to have all they could take to exchange for their own men within, should any happen to have been taken alive. Such were their plans.
But the Plataeans, while they were still deliberating, having suspected that there would be something of this kind, and being alarmed for those outside, sent out a herald to the Thebans, saying that they had not acted justly in what had been done, by endeavouring to seize their city in time of treaty; and told them not to injure what was without; else they also would put to death the men whom they had alive in their hands; but if they withdrew again from the territory, they would give the men back to them.
The Thebans give this account of the matter, and say that they swore to it. But the Plataeans do not acknowledge that they promised to give back the men immediately, but when proposals had first been made, in case of their coming to any agreement: and they deny that they wore to it. i. e. whichever of the two different statements was the more correct one. Such I think is generally the meaning of δ᾽ οὖν; and I doubt whether it has not this force, I. 3. 5. οἱ δ᾽ οὖν ὡς ἕκαστοι ῞ελληνες, κ. τ. λ. Whatever truth there may be in the theory just stated, certainly the Greeks did nothing in one united body, etc. Thus it approaches more nearly in signification to γοῦν than to the simple οὖν, with which it generally seems to be regarded as synonymous. The tragedians very frequently use it in this manner. In other passages, however, it has the proper force of each particle, and accordingly.
At any rate the Thebans retired from the territory without having done any injury; but the Plataeans, after getting in as quickly as possible whatever they had in the country, immediately put the men to death. Those who had been taken were one hundred and eighty, and Eurymachus, with whom the traitors had negotiated, was one of them.
When they had done this, they sent a messenger to Athens, and gave back the dead to the Thebans under a truce, and arranged matters in the city to suit their present circumstances, as seemed best to them.—Now news had immediately been taken to the Athenians of what had been done with respect to the Plataeans;
and they straightway seized as many of the Boeotians as were in Attica, and sent a herald to Plataea, with orders to forbid their proceeding to extremities, in the case of the Thebans whom they had in their hands, till they also should take counsel about them:
for tidings of their being dead had not yet reached them. For the first messenger [of the Plataeans] had gone out at the very time of the entering of the Thebans; and the second, when they had just been conquered and taken: so that of the subsequent events they knew nothing. Thus then the Athenians were in ignorance when they sent their order; and the herald, on his arrival, found the men slain.
After this the Athenians marched to Plataea, and brought in provisions, and left a garrison in it, and took out the least efficient of the men with the women and children.
When the business at Plataea had occurred, and the treaty had been clearly broken, the Athenians began to prepare for going to war; and so did the Lacedaemonians and their allies, both intending to send embassies to the king, and to the barbarians in other parts, from whatever quarter either party hoped to gain any assistance, and bringing into alliance with them such states as were not in their power.
And For the construction of this obscure sentence see Arnold's note on the side of the Lacedaemonians, in addition to the ships already on the spot in Sicily and Italy, belonging to those who had espoused their cause, they were ordered to build more according to the greatness of the cities, so that in the whole number they should amount to five hundred; and to get ready a certain sum of money which was mentioned, while they remained quiet in other respects, and received the Athenians coming with a single ship, till these preparations should be made.
The Athenians, on the other hand, were inspecting their present confederacy, and sending ambassadors to the countries more immediately around the Peloponnese, as Corcyra, Cephallenia, Acarnania, and Zacynthus; seeing that if these were firm friends to them, they would successfully carry on the war round the Peloponnese.
Indeed both parties had no small designs, but put forth their strength to the war: and not unnaturally; for all men at the beginning apply themselves to it more eagerly; and at that time the young men, being numerous in the Peloponnese, and also at Athens, were, through their inexperience, not unwilling to engage in the war. And the rest of Greece was all in excitement at the conflict of the principal states.
And many Poppo, Bredow, and Haack agree in considering λόγια as a more general term for any prophetic announcement whatever, in opposition to χρησμοί, which were metrical compositions, generally in hexameters or trimeter iam Dies, delivered by an oracle, and recited by persons who collected them, and were called χρησμολόγοι. For a specimen of the class, see the Birds of Aristophanes, v. 960. prophecies were repeated, and reciters of oracles were singing many of them, both amongst those who were going to war and in the other states.
Moreover, Delos had been visited by an earthquake a short time before this, though it had never had a shock before in the memory of the Greeks; and it was said and thought to have been ominous of what was about to take place. And whatever else of this kind had happened to occur was all searched up.
The good wishes of men made greatly for the Lacedaemonians, especially as they gave out that they were the liberators of Greece. And every individual, as well as state put forth his strength to help them in whatever he could, both by word and deed,; and each thought that the cause was impeded at that point at which he himself would not be present. So angry were the generality with the Athenians;
some from a wish to be released from their dominion, others from a fear of being brought under it. With such preparations and feelings then did they enter on the contest.
Each party had the following states in alliance when they set to the war. The allies of the Lacedaemonians were these:
all the Peloponnesians within the Isthmus, except the Argives and Achaeans (these were in friendship with both parties; and the Pellenians were the only people of the Achaeans that joined in the war at first, though afterwards all of them did); and without the Peloponnese, the Megareans, Locrians, Boeotians, Phocians, Ambraciots, Leucadians, and Anactorians.
Of these, the states which furnished a navy were the Corinthians, Megareans, Sicyonians, Pellenians, Eleans, Ambraciots, and Leucadians. Those that supplied cavalry were the Boeotians, Phocians, and Locrians. The rest of them sent infantry. This then was the Lacedaemonian confederacy.
That of the Athenians comprehended the Chians, Lesbians, Plataeans, the Messenians at Naupactus, the greater part of the Acarnanians, the Corcyreans, the Zacynthians: also some other states which were tributary amongst the following nations; as the maritime parts of Caria, and Doris adjacent to it, Ionia, the Hellespont, the Greek towns Thrace-ward; the islands, which were situated between the Peloponnese and Crete, towards the east, I am inclined to think that αἱ ἂλλαι κυκλάδες may signify the more westerly part of the group, in opposition to πρὸς ἥλιον ἀνίσχουσα. Otherwise Bloomfield's must be the only correct version; namely, all the Cyclades, etc. The fact of both Melos and Thera being amongst the most southerly of all the islands seems entirely to overthrow Göller's interpretation of the passage, which would refer αἱ ἄλλαι κυκλάδες to the islands east of Greece Proper, in contradistinction to the Peloponnese and Crete. and all the rest of the Cyclades except Melos and Thera.