Kitap 4
And there was never a change of government, effected by so small a number of men through the triumph of a faction, that lasted so long.
During the same summer, when Antandros was about to be strengthenedcf. 4.52.3. by the Mytilenaeans as they had planned, the generals in command of the Athenian ships which were collecting the tribute, namely, Demodocus and Aristides, who were in the neighbourhood of the Hellespont—for Lamachus, their colleague, had sailed into the Pontus with ten ships—heard of the fortification of the place and thought that there was danger of its becoming a menace to Lesbos, just as Anaea was to Samos2 cf. 3.19.2, 3.32.2.; for the Samian exiles, establishing themselves at Anaea, kept aiding the Peloponnesians by sending them pilots for their fleet, and also brought the Samians who lived in the city into a state of turmoil and continually offered a refuge to those who were sent into exile. The Athenian generals, therefore, collected an army from among the allies, sailed thither, defeated in battle those who came out against them from Antandros, and recovered the city.
And not long afterwards Lamachus, who had sailed into the Pontus and anchored in the river Cales in Heraclean territory, lost his ships in consequence of a rain which fell in the uplands and brought down a sudden flood. He and his army, however, going by land through the Bithynian Thracians, who were on the other side, in Asia, arrived at Chalcedon, the Megarian colony at the mouth of the Pontus.
During the same summer, immediately after the Athenians retired from Megara, Demosthenes, the Athenian general, arrived with forty ships at Naupactus.
For he and Hippocrates were engaged in negotiations about affairs in Boeotia, at the instance of certain men in several cities who wished to bring about a change in their form of government and to transform it into a democracy, such as the Athenians had. The leading spirit in these transactions was Ptoeodorus, an exile from Thebes, through whom Demosthenes and Hippocrates had brought about the following state of affairs.
Siphae, a town on the shore of the Crisaean Gulf in the territory of Thespiae, was to be betrayed by certain men; and Chaeronea, a city which is tributary to Orchomenus—the city which was formerly called Minyan, but is now called Boeotian—was to be put into the hands of the Athenians by others, the fugitives from Orchomenus, who also took into their pay some Peloponnesians, being especially active in the conspiracy. Some Phocians also had a share in the plot, Chaeronea being on the borders of Boeotia, and adjacent to Phanotis, which is in Phocis.
The Athenians were to occupy Delium, the sanctuary of Apollo which is in the territory of Tanagra and opposite Euboea; and all these events were to take place simultaneously on an appointed day, in order that the Boeotians might not concentrate their forces at Delium, but that the several states might be occupied with their own disaffected districts.
And if the attempt should succeed and Delium should be fortified, they confidently expected, even if no immediate change occurred in the constitutions of the Boeotian states, nevertheless, so long as these places were in their possession, from which Boeotian territory could be ravaged and where everyone might find a convenient place of refuge, the situation would not remain as it was, but in time, when the Athenians should come to the support of the rebels and the forces of the oligarchs were scattered, they could settle matters to their own advantage.
Such was the plot which was then under way. It was the purpose of Hippocrates, when the proper moment should arrive, to take troops from Athens and in person make an expedition into Boeotia; meanwhile he was sending Demosthenes in advance with a fleet of forty ships to Naupactus, in order that he should first collect in this region an army of Acarnanians and of other allies of Athens and then sail to Siphae, in expectation of its being betrayed; and a day was agreed upon between the two generals for doing these two things simultaneously.
Upon his arrival at Naupactus, Demosthenes found that Oeniadae had already been forced by all the rest of the Acarnanians to join the Athenian alliance; he himself then raised all the allied forces in that district, and after first making an expedition against Salynthius and the Agraeanscf. 3.111.4; 3.114.2. and securing these, proceeded with his other preparations so as to be present at Siphae when needed.
About the same time in the course of this summer, Brasidas, who was on his way to Thrace with one thousand seven hundred hoplites, reached Heracleia in Trachis and sent forward a messenger to his friends at Pharsalus requesting them to conduct him and his army through. Accordingly he was met at Meliteia in Achaia by Panaerus, Dorus, Hippolochidas, Torylaüs, and Strophacus, who was proxenus of the Chalcidians, and then proceeded on his march. He was conducted by several Thessalians also, among whom were Niconidas of Larisa, a friend of Perdiccas.
Indeed, Thessaly was not in any case an easy country to traverse without an escort, and especially with an armed force; and among all the Hellenes alike to traverse the territory of neighbours without their consent was looked on with suspicion. Besides, the common people of Thessaly had always been well disposed to the Athenians. If, therefore, the Thessalians had not been under the sway of a few powerful men, as is usual in that country, rather than under a free democracy, Brasidas would not have made headway;
even as it was, he was confronted on his march, when he reached the river Enipeus, by other Thessalians belonging to the opposite party. These tried to stop him, warning him that he was doing wrong in proceeding without the consent of the whole people.
But his conductors reassured them, saying that, it they were unwilling, they would not conduct him further, and that they were merely playing the part of hosts in escorting an unexpected visitor. Brasidas himself explained that he came as a friend to Thessaly and its inhabitants and was bearing arms against the Athenians, who were enemies, and not against them; moreover, he was not aware of any such hostility between the Thessalians and the Lacedaemonians as to debar them from access to each other's territory, but if in this instance they were unwilling, he would go no further, nor indeed could he do so;
he hoped, however, that they would not bar his progress. On hearing this the Thessalians departed; but Brasidas, taking the advice of his escort, before a larger force could be collected to hinder him, set out at full speed and without making any halt. In fact, he finished the journey to Pharsalus on the same day on which he had set out from Meliteia, and encamped on the river Apidanus;
thence he proceeded to Phacium, and from there to Perrhaebia. Here his Thessalian escort at length turned back, and the Perrhaebians, who are subjects of the Thessalians, brought him safely to Dium in the dominions of Perdiccas, a small town in Macedonia at the foot of Mt. Olympus, facing Thessaly.
It was in this manner that Brasidas succeeded in rushing through Thessaly before anyone could get ready to hinder him and reached Perdiccas and the Chalcidic peninsula.
The reason why the peoples in Thrace who had revolted from Athens had, in conjunction with Perdiccas, brought this army all the way from the Peloponnesus was that they were filled with alarm at the success of the Athenians. The Chalcidians thought that the Athenians would take the field against them first, and the cities in this neighbourhood which had not yet revolted nevertheless took part secretly in inviting the Peloponnesians to intervene. As for Perdiccas, although he was not yet openly hostile to Athens, he also was afraid of the long-standing differences between himself and the Athenians, and above all he was anxious to reduce Arrhabaeus, the king of the Lyncestians.
A further circumstance which rendered it easier for them to procure an army from the Peloponnesus was the evil fortune which at the present time attended the Lacedaemonians.
For since the Athenians kept harassing the Peloponnesians, and especially the territory of the Lacedaemonians, the latter thought that the best way of diverting them would be to retaliate by sending an army against their allies, especially since these allies were ready to maintain an army and were calling upon the Lacedaemonians for help in order that they might revolt.
Furthermore, the Lacedaemonians were glad to have an excuse for sending out some of the Helots, in order to forestall their attempting a revolt at the present juncture when Pylos was in the possession of the enemy.
Indeed, through fear of their youthMost MSS. read νεότητα B σκαιότητα, but some word meaning “boldness” or “recklessness” seems to be required. Hude adopts Widmann's conjecture καινότητα. and numbers —for in fact most of their measures have always been adopted by the Lacedaemonians with a view to guarding against the Helots—they had once even resorted to the following device. They made proclamation that all Helots who claimed to have rendered the Lacedaemonians the best service in war should be set apart, ostensibly to be set free. They were, in fact, merely testing them, thinking that those who claimed, each for himself, the first right to be set free would be precisely the men of high spirit who would be the most likely to attack their masters.
About two thousand of them were selected and these put crowns on their heads and made the rounds of the temples, as though they were already free, but the Spartans not long afterwards made away with them, and nobody ever knew in what way each one perished.
So, on the present occasion, the Spartans gladly sent with Brasidas seven hundred Helots as hoplites, the rest of his forces being drawn from the Peloponnesus by the inducement of pay.
As for Brasidas himself, the Lacedaemonians sent him chiefly at his own desire, though the Chalcidians also were eager to have him. He was a man esteemed at Sparta as being energetic in everything he did, and indeed, after he had gone abroad, he proved invaluable to the Lacedaemonians.
For, at the present crisis, by showing himself just and moderate in his dealings with the cities he caused most of the places to revolt, and secured possession of others by the treachery of their inhabitants, so that when the Lacedaemonians wished to make terms with Athens, as they did ultimately,421 B.C.; cf. xvii. they had places to offer in exchange for places they wished to recover and were able to secure for the Peloponnesus a respite from the war; and in the later part of the war, after the events in Sicily, it was the virtue and tact which Brasidas had displayed at this time—qualities of which some had had experience, while others knew of them by report—that did most to inspire in the allies of the Athenians a sentiment favourable to the Lacedaemonians.
For since he was the first Lacedaemonian abroad who gained a reputation for being in all respects a good man, he left behind him a confident belief that the other Lacedaemonians also were of the same stamp.
On the arrival of Brasidas in Thrace at the time referred to,cf. 4.79.1. the Athenians, on hearing of it, declared Perdiccas an enemy, regarding him as responsible for his coming, and they established a stricter watch over their allies in that region.
But Perdiccas immediately took Brasidas and his army, together with his own forces, and made an expedition against his neighbour Arrhabaeus, son of Bromerus, king of the Lyncestian Macedonians; for he had a quarrel with him and wished to subdue him.
But when he and Brasidas arrived with their combined armies at the pass leading to Lyncus, Brasidas said that he wished, before appealing to arms, to have a conference with Arrhabaeus and make him an ally of the Lacedaemonians, if he could.
For it seemed that Arrhabaeus had made some overtures and was ready to submit the question at issue to Brasidas' arbitration; the Chalcidian envoys who were present also kept urging him not to remove the difficulties from the path of Perdiccas, since they wished to have in him a more zealous helper in their own affairs.
Furthermore, the envoys of Perdiccas, when they were at Lacedaemon, had given a hint to the effect that he would bring many of the places in his neighbourhood into alliance with the Lacedaemonians; consequently Brasidas was inclined to insist upon having a freer hand in dealing with Arrhabaeus.
But Perdiccas said that he had not brought Brasidas to be a judge of their quarrels, but rather to be a destroyer of any enemies whom he himself might designate, and that Brasidas would do wrong if, when he himself maintained half the army, he should parley with Arrhabaeus.
But Brasidas, in spite of Perdiccas and after a quarrel with him, held the conference, and finding the king's arguments convincing, withdrew his army without invading his country. After this Perdiccas contributed only a third instead of one-half of the maintenance, considering himself to be aggrieved.
Immediately afterwards during the same summer and a short time before the vintage season, Brasidas took some Chalcidians in addition to his own force and made an expedition against Acanthus, the colony of the Andrians.
But on the question of admitting him the Acanthians were divided among themselves, on the one side being those who, in concert with the Chalcidians, asked him to intervene, and on the other side the popular party. However, when Brasidas urged them to admit him unattended and then, after hearing what he had to say, to deliberate on the matter, the populace consented, for they had fears concerning the grapes, which had not yet been gathered. So he came before the people—and indeed, for a Lacedaemonian, he was not wanting in ability as a speaker—and addressed them as follows:
"Citizens of Acanthus, the Lacedaemonians have sent me and my army to prove the truth of what we proclaimed at the beginning to be the cause of the war, when we said that we were going to war with the Athenians for the liberation of Hellas.
But if we have arrived late, disappointed as we have been with regard to the war at home, where we had hoped to destroy the Athenians quite speedily, by our own efforts and without involving you in the danger, do not blame us;
for we are here now, having come as soon as opportunity offered, and together with you we shall try to subdue them.
But I am amazed at the closing of your gates against me, and that my coming has been unwelcome to you. For we Lacedaemonians, thinking, even before we actually came, that we should find ourselves among men who were allies in spirit at least and that we should be welcomed, have hazarded the great danger of travelling a journey of many days through an alien territory and have shown all possible zeal.