Kitap 4
For there is no disgrace in kinsmen giving way to kinsmen, a Dorian to a Dorian or a Chalcidian to men of the same race, since we are, in a word, neighbours and together are dwellers in a single land encircled by the sea and are called by a single name, Siceliots. We shall go to war, no doubt, whenever occasion arises—yes, and we shall make peace again by taking common counsel among ourselves;
but when alien peoples invade us, we shall always act in concert, if we are prudent, and repel them, seeing that any injury suffered by one of us brings danger to us all; but never henceforth shall we ask outsiders to intervene, either as allies or as mediators.
If we follow this policy, we shall at the present time not rob Sicily of two desirable things—getting rid of the Athenians and escaping from civil war—and for the future we shall dwell here by ourselves in a land that is free and less exposed to the plotting of others.”
After Hermocrates had spoken to this effect the Siceliots, accepting his advice, came to an understanding among themselves. They agreed to end the war, each city keeping what it had, except that the Camarinaeans were to have Morgantina on payment of a stated sum of money to the Syracusans.
The Sicilian allies of the Athenians then summoned the Athenian generals and said that they proposed to make peace and that the treaty would also include them. And when the generals assented, they proceeded to make the agreement, whereupon the Athenian fleet sailed away from Sicily.
But when it arrived at Athens, the Athenians sentenced to exile two of the generals, Pythodorus and Sophocles, and fined Eurymedon, the third, on the charge that when it had been in their power to subdue Sicily they had been bribed to withdraw from it.
To such an extent, because of their present good fortune, did they expect to be thwarted in nothing, and believed that, no matter whether their forces were powerful or deficient, they could equally achieve what was easy and what was difficult. The cause of this was the amazing success which attended most of their undertakings and inspired them with strong confidence.
The same summer the people of the city of Megara, being harassed in the war by the Athenians, who regularly invaded their country in full force twice every year, and also by their own exiles in Pegae, who had been expelled in a revolution by the popular party and kept annoying them by raiding the country, began to say to one another that they ought to receive the fugitives back, so that the city should not be exposed to ruin from both directions at once.
And the friends of the exiles, noticing the murmuring of the people, all began more openly than before to urge that this proposal be adopted.
But the leaders of the popular party, realizing that the populace under the pressure of their distress would not be able to hold out with them, became frightened and made overtures to the Athenian generals, Hippocrates son of Ariphron and Demosthenes son of Alcisthenes, proposing to surrender the city to them; for they thought that this course would be less dangerous to themselves than the restoration of the citizens whom they had banished. They agreed, in the first place, that the Athenians should take possession of the long walls (the distance between the city and the harbour at Nisaea was about eight stadia), in order to prevent the Peloponnesians from sending reinforcements from Nisaea, where they formed the sole garrison to keep their hold on Megara, and, in the second place, that they would do their best to hand over to them the upper-town as well, believing that, as soon as this was done, their fellow-citizens would more readily go over to the Athenian side.
So, then, as soon as due preparations, both in word and act, had been made by both parties, the Athenians sailed under cover of night to Minoa, the island which lies off Megara, taking six hundred hoplites under the command of Hippocrates, and took cover in a ditch, not far from the town, where bricks had been made for the walls.
A second company consisting of light-armed Plataeans and frontier-patrols under the command of the other general, Demosthenes, set an ambuscade at Enyalius, which is somewhat nearer. And all that night no one perceived what was going on except the men whose business it was to know.
Then, at the approach of dawn, these would-be Megarian traitors began their work as follows. For a long time before this they had been carefully preparing for the opening of the gates by regularly assuming the guise of pirates and taking a sculling boat, drawn on a cart, through the ditch and down to the sea, where they would put out. This they did every night, first securing the consent of the commander.i.e., of the Peloponnesian garrison. Then before daybreak they would cart the boat back into the fortifications, taking it in by way of the gates, their object being, as they pretended, to keep the Athenian garrison, which was stationed at Minoa, in the dark, as no boat would be visible in the harbour.
On the night in question the cart was already at the gates, and when these were opened as usual as if to let the boat pass through, the Athenians, who were acting throughout in accordance with an agreement, seeing it, ran at top speed from their ambush, wishing to get there before the gates were closed again and while the cart was still in the passage, thus forming an obstacle to the shutting of the gates; and at the same time their Megarian accomplices killed the guards at the gates.
And first the Plataeans and the patrols under Demosthenes' command rushed into the place where the trophy now stands, and as soon as they were inside the gates the Plataeans engaged with the reinforcements which came up—for the nearest Peloponnesians had become aware of what was going on—and defeated them, thus securing the gates for the onrushing Athenian hoplites.
After that every Athenian who got inside immediately made for the wall.
A few of the Peloponnesian garrison at first stood their ground and defended themselves, some of them being killed, but most of them took to flight, being seized with panic, both because the enemy had attacked them at night, and also because they thought the Megarian traitors were fighting against them; and they supposed that all the Megarians had betrayed them.
For it so happened also that the Athenian herald, acting on his own responsibility, made a proclamation that any Megarian who so desired might espouse the cause of the Athenians. When the garrison heard this proclamation it no longer held out, but, verily believing that a concerted attack was being made upon them, fled to Nisaea.
And at daybreak, when the walls had already been taken and the Megarians in the city were in a tumult, those who had negotiated with the Athenians, and a large number besides who were privy to the plot, expressed the opinion that they ought to open the gates and go out to battle.
It had, in fact, been agreed between them and the Athenians, that as soon as the gates were opened the Athenians should rush in, and, in order that they might themselves escape injury, they were to be distinguished from the rest by being anointed with oil. They were also to have additional security in thus opening the gates, since the men. who according to the compact were to march by night from Eleusis, four thousand Athenian hoplites and six hundred cavalry, were now at hand.Or, retaining πορευόμενοι with the MSS. and rejecting οἱ before τὴν νύκτα, “since the men from Eleusis, four thousand Athenian hoplites and six hundred cavalry, according to the compact had marched all night and were now at hand.”
But after they had anointed themselves and were already near the gates, an accomplice divulged the plot to the other party. And they, gathering in a body, came and declared that they ought neither to march out to fight—for they had never ventured to do such a thing before, even when they were stronger —nor to bring the city into manifest danger; and, they added, should anyone refuse to obey, the fight would take place on the spot. But they gave no signs whatever that they were aware of the plot which was going on, but stoutly maintained that their advice was for the best, and at the same time stayed about the gates keeping watch, so that the plotters had no opportunity to carry out their intentions.
The Athenian generals, however, saw that some obstacle had arisen and that they would not be able to take the city by force, and therefore at once began to invest Nisaea with a wall, thinking that, if they could take this town before any succour came, Megara also would soon capitulate.
A supply of iron quickly arrived from Athens, as well as stonemasons and whatever else was needed. Beginning then at the part of the fortification which they already held and building a cross-wall on the side of it facing Megara, from that point they built out on either side of Nisaea as far as the sea, the army apportioning among them the ditch and the walls and using stones and bricks from the suburbs. Moreover, they cut down fruit-trees and forest-wood and built stockades wherever they were needed; and the houses of the suburbs with the addition of battlements of themselves furnished a rampart.
They worked the whole of this first day, but on the next day toward evening when the wall was all but finished the garrison of Nisaea, becoming alarmed by the shortage of food, seeing that they received provisions from the upper-city for only a day at a time, and not anticipating any speedy relief from the Peloponnesians, and believing the Megarians to be hostile, capitulated to the Athenians on condition that they should give up their arms and pay a ransom of a stipulated amount for each man; as for the Lacedaemonians in the garrison, the commander or anyone else, they were to be disposed of as the Athenians might wish. On these terms they came to an agreement and marched out.
The Athenians then made a breach in the long walls in order to separate them from the wall of the city of Megara, took possession of Nisaea, and proceeded with their other preparations.
At this time Brasidas son of Tellis, a Lacedaemonian, happened to be in the neighbourhood of Sicyon and Corinth, preparing a force for use in the region of Thrace. And when he heard of the capture of the walls, fearing for the safety of the Peloponnesians in Nisaea and apprehensive lest Megara should be taken, he sent to the Boeotians requesting them to come in haste with an army and to meet him at Tripodiscus, which is the name of a village in the district of Megara at the foot of Mount Geraneia. He himself set out with two thousand seven hundred Corinthian hoplites, four hundred from Phlius, seven hundred from Sicyon, and such troops of his own as had already been levied, thinking that he would arrive before Nisaea had been taken.
But when he learned the truth—for he happened to have gone out by night to Tripodiscus—he selected three hundred of his own army, and before his approach was known reached the city of Megara unobserved by the Athenians, who were down by the sea. His plan was, ostensibly—and really, too, if it should prove possible—to make an attempt upon Nisaea, but most of all to get into the city of Megara and secure it. And he demanded that they should receive him, saying that he was in hopes of recovering Nisaea.
But the rival factions of Megara were afraid, the one that he might bring in the exiles and drive them out, the other that the populace, fearing this very thing, might attack them, and that the city, being at war with itself, while the Athenians were lying in wait near at hand, might be ruined. They, therefore, did not admit Brasidas, both parties thinking it best to wait and see what would happen.
For each party expected that there would be a battle between the Athenians and the relieving army, and so it was safer for them not to join the side which anyone favoured until it was victorious. So then Brasidas, when he could not persuade them, withdrew once more to his own army.
At daybreak the Boeotians arrived. They had intended, even before Brasidas summoned them, to go to the aid of Megara, feeling that the danger was not alien to them, and were already at Plataea with all their forces; but when the summons actually came, they were greatly strengthened in their purpose, and sent on two thousand two hundred hoplites and six hundred cavalry, returning home with the larger part of their army.
Then, finally, when their whole army was at hand, consisting of not less than six thousand hoplites, and the Athenian hoplites were in line about Nisaea and the sea, while the lightarmed troops were scattered up and down the plain, the Boeotian cavalry fell upon the latter and drove them to the sea. The attack was unexpected, for hitherto no reinforcements had ever come to the Megarians from any quarter.
But the Athenian horsemen charged upon them in turn and a prolonged cavalry action ensued, in which both sides claimed to have held their own.
The Athenians did succeed in killing the commander of the Boeotian cavalry and a few others who had charged to the very walls of Nisaea and despoiled them, and having got possession of their bodies they gave them back under a truce and set up a trophy; in the action as a whole, however, neither side finally gained a decisive advantage, and so they separated, the Boeotians going to their own army, the Athenians to Nisaea.
After this Brasidas and his army advanced nearer to the sea and the city of Megara, and there, taking up an advantageous position, they drew up their lines and kept quiet, thinking that the Athenians would come against them, and feeling assured that the Megarians would wait to see which side would be victorious.
And they thought that matters stood well with them in both of two respects: in the first place, they were not forcing an engagement and had not deliberately courted the risk of a battle, although they had at least plainly shown that they were ready to defend themselves, so that the victory would justly be accredited to them almost without a blow; and at the same time they thought that things were turning out right as regards the Megarians also.
For if they had failed to put in an appearance there would have been no chance for them, but they would clearly have lost the city at once just as though they had been defeated; but by this move there was the possible chance that the Athenians themselves would not care to fight, with the result that they would have gained what they came for without a battle. And this is just what happened.
For the Megarians did what was expected of them.Apparently there is an anacoluthon, the sentence beginning as if τῷ βρασίδα ἀνοίγουσι τὰς πύλας were to be the predicate, but after the long parenthesis the subject is resumed in partitive form, αἱ τῶν φευγόντων φίλοι μεγαρῆς. When the Athenians came out and drew up their lines before the long walls, they too kept quiet, since the Peloponnesians did not attack, and their generals also reckoned that they were running an unequal risk, now that almost all their plans had turned out well, to begin a battle against larger numbers, and either be victorious and take Megara, or, if defeated, have the flower of their hoplite force damaged; whereas the Peloponnesians would naturally be willing to risk an engagement which would involve, for each contingent, only a portion of the entire army or of the troops there at hand.The text is clearly corrupt, but the general sense seems to be that given above. Both armies therefore waited for some time, and when no attack was made from either side, the Athenians were the first to withdraw, retiring to Nisaea, and next the Peloponnesians, returning to the place from which they had set out. So then, finally, the Megarians who were friends of the exiles plucked up courage, and opened the gates to Brasidas and the commanders from the various cities, in the feeling that he had won the victory and that the Athenians had finally declined battle.Or, adopting Rutherford's conjecture, ἐθελησόντων “and that the Athenians would not care to fight again.” And receiving them into the town they entered into a conference with them, the party which had been intriguing with the Athenians being now quite cowed.
Afterwards, when the Peloponnesian allies had been dismissed to their several cities, Brasidas went back to Corinth and began preparations for the expedition to Thrace, whither he had originally been bound.
But when the Athenians also returned home, all the Megarians who had been most implicated in the negotiations with the Athenians, knowing that they had been detected, immediately withdrew secretly from the city, while the rest, communicating with the friends of the exiles, brought them back from Pegae, after first binding them on their oath by strong pledges not to harbour ill-will, but to consult for the best interests of the city.
But as soon as these men attained office and had made an inspection of arms, separating the companies they selected about one hundred of their personal enemies and of those who seemed to have had the largest part in the negotiations with the Athenians, and compelling the popular assembly to take an open vote concerning these, when they had been condemned, slew them, and established an extreme oligarchy in the city.