Book 4
As for the Lacedaemonians, they had never before experienced predatory warfare of this kind, and therefore, when the Helots began to desert and there was reason to fear that the revolutionary movement might gain still further headway in their territory, they were uneasy, and, in spite of their desire not to betray their alarm to the Athenians, kept sending envoys to them in the endeavour to recover Pylos and the prisoners.
But the Athenians constantly made greater demands and the envoys, although they came again and again, were always sent home unsuccessful. Such were the events at Pylos.
During the same summer and directly after these events the Athenians made an expedition into Corinthian territory with eighty ships and two thousand Athenian hoplites, together with two hundred cavalry on board horse-transports; allied forces also went with them, namely Milesian, Andrian, and Carystian troops, the whole being under the command of Nicias son of Niceratus and two others.
These sailed and at day-break landed midway between the peninsula Chersonesus and the stream Rheitus, at a point on the beach over which rises the Solygeian hill-the hill where the Dorians in olden timesAt the time when the Dorians, under the leadership of the Heracleidae, got possession of the Peloponnesus (cf. 1.12.3). See Busolt, Gr. Gesch. i. 208, ed. 2. established themselves when they made war upon the Corinthians in the city, who were Aeolians; and there is still on the hill a village called Solygeia. From this point on the beach where the ships put in to shore this village is twelve stadia distant, the city of Corinth sixty, and the Isthmus twenty.
But the Corinthians, having previous information from Argos that the Athenian army would come, had long before occupied the Isthmus with all their forces, except those who dwelt north of the Isthmus and five hundred Corinthians who were away doing garrison duty in AmbraciaThree hundred of these had been sent the previous winter to Ambracia, which was a Corinthian colony; cf. 3.114.4. and Leucas; all the rest to a man were now there, watching to see where the Athenians would land.
But when the Athenians eluded them by making their landing by night and the Corinthians were notified by the raising of fire-signals, these left half of their troops at Cenchraeae,The Corinthian eastern haven, seventy stadia from the city. in case the Athenians should after all go against Crommyon,The chief place on this coast-line between the Isthmus and Megara, some 120 stadia from Corinth, known as the haunt of the wild boar killed by Theseus (Paus. I. xxvii. 9; II. i. 3). and in haste rushed to the defence.
Thereupon Battus, one of the two Corinthian generals present at the battle, took a company and went to the village of Solygeia, which was unwalled, to guard it, while Lycophron attacked with the remainder of their troops.
Now at first the Corinthians assailed the right wing of the Athenians, which had just disembarked in front of Chersonesus, and afterwards engaged the rest of the army also. The battle was stubbornly contested throughout and fought at close quarters.
The Athenian right wing, at whose extremity were stationed the Carystians, received the charge of the Corinthians and drove them back, though with difficulty; but the latter retreated to a stone fence and, since the ground was everywhere a steep slope, pelted the Athenians with stones, being on higher ground, and then, raising the paean, charged a second time. The Athenians received the charge and the battle was again waged at close quarters.
Then a company of the Corinthians, reinforcing their own left wing, routed the right wing of the Athenians and pursued it to the sea; but again upon reaching the ships the Athenians and Carystians rallied.
The other divisions of the two armies were continuously engaged, especially the right wing of the Corinthians, where Lycophron was in command against the Athenian left and kept it in check; for they expected the Athenians to make an attempt against the village of Solygeia.
For a long time they held out, neither side yielding to the other. Then as the Athenians had an advantage in the support of their cavalry, whereas the other side had no horses, the Corinthians turned and retired to the hill, where they halted, and did not come down again but remained quiet.
In this repulse it was on their right wing that most of the Corinthians that were lost were killed, among them Lycophron the general. But the rest of the Corinthian army retired in this manner—there was no long pursuit nor hasty flight, but when it was forced back, it withdrew to the higher ground and there established itself.
As for the Athenians, when the enemy no longer came against them and offered battle, they stripped the corpses, took up their own dead, and straightway set up a trophy.
Meanwhile the other half of the Corinthian forces, which was stationed at Cenchraeae as a garrison to prevent the Athenians from making a descent upon Crommyon, were unable to see the battle because Mt. Oneium intervened; but when they saw the cloud of dust and realized what was going on, they rushed thither at once, as did also the older men in the city of Corinth when they perceived what had happened.
But the Athenians, seeing the whole throng advancing and thinking it to be a detachment of the neighbouring Peloponnesians coming to assist the Corinthians, withdrew in haste to their ships, having their spoils and the bodies of their own dead, except two, which they left behind because they were not able to find them.
So they embarked and crossed over to the adjacent islands, and sending thence a herald recovered under truce the bodies which they had left behind. There were slain in this battle two hundred and twelve of the Corinthians, and of the Athenians somewhat fewer than fifty.
Setting out from the islands, the Athenians sailed the same day to Crommyon in Corinthian territory, which is distant a hundred and twenty stadia from the city, and coming to anchor ravaged the land and bivouacked during the night.
The next day sailing along the coast they came first to the territory of Epidaurus, where they made a landing, and then to Methana, between Epidaurus and Troezen, where they walled off the neck of the peninsula on which Methana lies. Here they left a garrison, which afterward occupied itself with marauding excursions into the territory of Troezen, Halieis, and Epidaurus. But the fleet sailed back to Athens as soon as the fortifications at Methana had been completed.
It was at this time, while these events were occurring, that Eurymedon and Sophocles,cf. 4.8.3; 4.29.1. setting sail from Pylos for Sicily with an Athenian fleet, arrived at Corcyra. There they took part with the men from the cityThe democrats who had held the city since 427 B. C. (cf. 1.lxxxv.). in an expedition against the Corcyraeans who had established themselves on Mt. Istone, and who at this time, after crossing over thither subsequently to the revolution, were dominating the country and doing a great deal of damage.
The stronghold was taken by assault, but the men in it fled in a body to some high ground and there capitulated, on condition that they should surrender their mercenary troops and give up their arms, leaving it to the Athenian people to decide upon their own fate.
The generals accordingly conveyed the men under truce to the island of Ptychiacf. iii. lxxv. 5; now called Vido. to be kept under custody there until they should be sent to Athens, and the understanding was that if anyone should be caught trying to run away the truce should be regarded as broken for them all.
But the leaders of the popular party at Corcyra were afraid that the Athenians would not put them to death on their arrival at Athens, and therefore resorted to the following stratagem.
They first tried to persuade a few of the men on the island to run away, by secretly sending thither friends who were instructed to say, with a show of good will, that the best course for them was to do this with no loss of time, and promising to have a boat ready; for the Athenian generals, they explained, were intending to deliver them up to the Corcyraean populace.
And when the men had been persuaded, and were caught sailing away in the boat which the others had provided. the truce was broken and the whole party was delivered up to the Corcyraeans.
But what chiefly contributed to such a result, so that the pretext seemed quite plausible and that those who devised the scheme felt little fear about putting it into effect, was the fact that the Athenian generals showed that they would not be willing, as they were bound for Sicily themselves, to have the men conveyed to Athens by others, who would thus get the credit for conducting them.
Now the Corcyraeans took over the prisoners and shut them up in a large building; afterwards they led them out in groups of twenty and marched them down between two lines of hoplites stationed on either side, the prisoners being bound to one another and receiving blows and stabs from the men who stood in the lines, if any of these perchance saw among them a personal enemy; and men with scourges walked by their sides to quicken the steps of such as proceeded too slowly on the way.
In this manner about sixty men were led out and killed without the knowledge of the men who remained in the house, who supposed that their companions were being led out in order to be transferred to some other place. But when they perceived what was going on, or were told by somebody, they appealed to the Athenians and urged them, if they wished to kill them, to do so with their own hands; and they refused thenceforth to leave the house, and declared that they would not allow anyone to enter if they could prevent it.
Nor had the Corcyraeans themselves any intention of trying to force their way in by the doors, but climbing on to the top of the building and breaking through the roof they hurled tiles and shot arrows upon them from above.
The men inside tried to defend themselves as best as they could, and at the same time most of them set to work to destroy themselves by thrusting into their throats the arrows which the enemy had shot or by strangling themselves with the cords from some beds that happened to be in the place or with strips made from their own garments. Thus for the greater part of the night—for night fell upon their misery—dispatching themselves in every fashion and struck by the missiles of the men on the roof, they perished.
When day came the Corcyraeans loaded the bodies on wagons, laying them lengthwise and crosswise, and hauled them out of the city; but the women who had been captured in the fort were sold into captivity.
In such fashion the Corcyraeans from the mountain were destroyed by the popular party, and the revolution, which had lasted long, ended thus, so far at least as this war was concerned; for there were no longer enough of the oligarchs left to be of any account.
But the Athenians sailed for Sicily, whither they had set out in the first place, and proceeded to carry on the war in conjunction with their allies in the island.
At the end of the same summer the Athenians at Naupactus and the Acarnanians made a campaign, and took by the treachery of its inhabitants Anactorium, a city belonging to the Corinthians which is situated at the mouth of the Ambracian Gulf; and the Acarnanians, expelling the Corinthians, occupied the place with colonists drawn from all their tribes. And the summer ended.
During the following winter AristidesMentioned again 4.75.1 as general in these waters. son of Archippus, one of the commanders of the Athenian ships which had been sent to the allies to collect the revenues, arrested at Eion on the Strymon Artaphernes, a Persian, who was on his way from the King to Lacedaemon.
He was conveyed to Athens, and the Athenians caused his letters to be transcribed from the Assyrian characters and read them. Many other matters were touched upon therein, but the most important, with reference to the Lacedaemonians, was that the King did not know what they wanted; for though many envoys had come to him, no two told the same tale; if therefore they had any definite proposal to make, they should send men to him in company with the Persian.
As for Artaphernes, the Athenians afterwards sent him to Ephesus in a trireme, together with some envoys; these, however, hearing there of the recent death of King Artaxerxes son of Xerxes—for he died about that timeAfter a reign of forty years (465-425 B C.).—returned to Athens.
The same winter the Chians demolished their new wall at the bidding of the Athenians, who suspected them of planning an insurrection against themselves; they, however, obtained from the Athenians pledges and such security as they could that they would adopt no harsh measures against them. And the winter ended, and with it the seventh year of this war of which Thucydides composed the history.
At the very beginning of the next summer a424 B.C. partial eclipse of the sun took place at new moon, and in the early part of the same month
an earthquake. Also the citizens of Mytilene and of the other cities of Lesbos who were in exile, the majority of them setting out from the mainland, hired some mercenaries from the Peloponnesus, gathered still others on the spot, and took Rhoeteum; but they restored it again without having done any damage, on receiving two thousand