τὸ πρὸς βορέαν τοῦ κύκλου τεῖχος
—either ‘a wall to wards the north of the fort,’ or ‘the wall north of the fort.’ It is not clear whether
τὸ πρὸς β. agrees with
τεῖχος or not. Thuc. distinguishes
κύκλος from
ἀποτείχισμα.
αἰεί
—with
παρέβαλλον.
βραχύτατον
—the distance from the
κύκλος to Trogilus (
ἐπὶ τὴν ἐτέραν θάλασσαν) would be about a mile and a half, and the same from the
κύκλος to the harbour.
ἐγίγνετο
=
ἔμελλον ἔσεσθαι, Schol.
ὑποτειχίζειν
—‘build an intercepting wall’; cf.
ὑπομόσαι .
ἀποκλῄσεις γίγνεσθαι—ἀποκλῄσεις is subject of (
ἔμελλον). The plur. may allude to the fact that, as the A. were building two walls, Syr. would be shut in in two directions.
ἐπιβοηθοῖεν
—sc.
οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι. ‘If they sent to prevent them while they were building.’
ἀντιπέμπειν αὐτοῖς
—sc.
ἐδόκει ἄμεινον εἶναι. At
καὶ φθάνειν ἄν the passage is continued in
O.O.
τὰς ἐφόδους
—either ‘attacks’ on the wall which would be ‘checked’ by a stockade, or else the ‘approaches’ which would be ‘occupied’ before the wall itself was built. In either case the sense is the same: the
σταυροί are to protect the builders, and are a temporary shelter.
ἀπὸ τῆς ς. πόλεως
—from some point in the wall of Temenites.
κάτωθεν τοῦ κύκλου
—‘south of the fort.’ The reasons for the choice were—(1) the A. would be prevented from reaching the Great Harbour, (2) the north was unsuitable, because the A. fleet was at Thapsus, and a counterwork there would be exposed on two sides to an attack, (3) the A. were busy at the north, and their attention was withdrawn from the south. (Leake, Arnold, Grote, Holm, and Classen place the wall at the south. But Göller, Dunbar, Didot, and Stahl place it
north of the
κύκλος, rendering
κάτωθεν ‘on lower ground than.’ But (1) c. 100, 2
κατέφνγον ἐς τὸ προτείχισμα τὸ περὶ τὃν Τεμενίτην is against this. (2) If the wall was
north of the
κύκλος, why did the A. leave off building at the north wall after destroying the counterwork? They would have pressed on in that direction to prevent the Syr. from repeating their attempt to traverse the north wall. But if the Syr. built south, between the
κύκλος and
κρημνός, Nicias had a good reason for building at once across this space, instead of continuing on the northern wall. (3) As
κάτωθεν can mean ‘south of,’ it is unlikely that Thuc. would have used it to describe a wall north of the
κύκλος, as such a description would certainly mislead.)
ἐγκάρσιον
—at right angles to the A. wall.
τοῦ τεμένους
—
i.e. in the Temenites, for which see c. 75, 1.
πύργους ξυλίνους
—probably on the south side of the wall.
αἱ δὲ νῆες κτλ
—this explains on the one hand how it was that the Syr. were not open to attack from the harbour, on the other why the A. were able to get provisions in spite of the Syr. counterwork and possession of the harbour.
ὅσα τε ἐσταυρώθη καὶ ᾠκοδομήθη
—
i.e. the
ὑποτείχισμα consisted partly of palisading and partly of stone-work. The exact relations between the
σταύρωμα and
οἰκοδόμημα cannot be determined. Thuc. himself is not clear, for he speaks presently of
φύλακα τοῦ οἰκοδήματος, and farther on alludes to part of the same people as
οἱ ἐν τῷ σταυρώματι φυλάσσοντες. Observe that
τε is misplaced.
μάχωνται
—sc.
οἱ Συρακόσιοι.
τὴν καθ) αὑτούς—at the north.
τούς τε ὀχετοὺς . . διέφθειραν
—the elaborate aqueducts of Syr., of which there are many remains, were partly open, partly underground.
ποτοῦ ὕδατος
—belongs to
ὀχετούς, but is attracted into the rel. clause.
τούς τε ἄλλους
—
i.e. those of the
φυλή who were not
ἐν τῷ σταυρώματι φυλάσσοντες.
ἐξαπιναίως
—this and
ἐξαπίνης, for
ἐξαίφνης and
αἰφνιδίως, are Ionic. For
εἰ ἐπιβοηθοῖεν
see Index s.
εἰ.
ἡ δὲ . . τὸ παρὰ τὴν πυλίδα
—while a body of 300 picked men was making for the
ὑποτείχισμα, or that portion of it that consisted only of palisading, a division of the army marched to another
σταύρωμα—viz. ‘that by the postern gate’; but whether this
πυλίς was in the walls of the city or in the
ὑποτείχισμα is not stated. On the one hand there may well have been a gate in the
ὑποτείχισμα to admit from one side to the other, and this may be one of the
ἔφοδοι alluded to in c. 99, 2. But the 300 picked men would be sufficient to attack this, and it ought to be some gate through which help might come to those at the counterwork. Hence most probably it is a gate in the wall of Temenites, south of the point where the counterwork sprang from the wall; so that one division of the A. army marched north, the other south of the
ὑποτείχισμα.
τὸ σταύρωμα
—sc.
τοῦ ὑποτειχίσματος. CavallariHolm seem to identify this wrongly with
τὸ σταύρωμα τὸ παρὰ τἡν πυλίδα .
τὸ προτείχισμα
—see c. 75, 1. The Syr. probably rushed through the
πυλίς, and the pursuers ran in after them, accompanied by some of the division that was marching on the
σταύρωμα there. Among these last were some Argives (§ 3), who, being hoplites (c. 43, 2), were not among the
ἐκλεκτοί of § 1.
τὴν . . ὑποτείχισιν
=
τὁ οἰκοδόμημα of § 1. On
διεφόρησαν
see c. 91, 7
ἐτείχιζον τὸν κρημνόν
—‘they proceeded to build a wall on the cliff,’ not ‘built a wall along the cliff,’ as Classen. This is the short piece of wall that ran from the
κύκλος to the
Portella del Fusco, and is more accurately described in § 3 as
τὸ πρὸς τὸν κρημνόν. (Arnold, Grote, and Freeman understand ‘they fortified a point on the cliff,’ and assume that Nicias subsequently filled in the space between this new fort and the
κύκλος with a wall which Thuc. does not mention. They increase the difficulty by placing the
κύκλος too far north. Lupus, Stahl, and Fr. Muller read <
ἐς>
τὸν κρημνόν, but this is not necessary when the
κύκλος is rightly placed, the distance now built being so short that the wall ‘
to the cliff’ can be fairly called a wall ‘
on the cliff.’)
ὑπὲρ τοῦ ἕλους
—Lysimeleia, now
Pantanelli.
τῶν Ἐπιπολῶν
depends on
ταύτῃ.
διὰ τοῦ ὁμαλοῦ
—a lower level than Epipolae, but not so low as the marsh.
αὖθις
—again they built out westward, and made another effort to prevent the A. from reaching the harbour, but this time on the lowest level. Probably the palisade and ditch were not completed.
τὸ πρὸς τὸν κρημνόν
—see on § 2.
ἐκ τῆς Θάψου
— it was a mistake to abandon Thapsus altogether.
περὶ ὄρθρον
—cf.
IV. 110
νυκτὸς ἔτι καὶ περὶ ὄρθρον. Phrynichus says
ὄρθρος ἐστιν ἡ ὥρα τῆς νυκτὸς καθ) ἣν ἀλεκτρύονες ἄδουσιν. ἄρχεται δὲ ἐνάτης ὥρας καὶ τελευτᾷ εἰς διαγελῶσαν ἡμέραν .
καὶ διὰ τοῦ ἕλους
—Classen takes this with
διαβαδίσαντες, so that
ᾗ πηλῶδες . . ἐπιθέντες is parenthetical; whereas Krüger joins it with
ἐπιθέντες, which makes an awkward expression. Stahl renders ‘in fact over the marsh,’ apparently regarding it as an explanation of
ἐς τὸ ὁμαλόν: but
τὸ ὁμαλόν and
τὸ ἕλος are different levels. Classen is probably right.
τὸ δεξιὸν κέρας
—the Syr. line was facing towards the north, so that the right wing made for the city, the left ran along the left bank of the Anapus to the bridge by which the Helorine road crossed it (the Syr. had restored it since the incident mentioned in c. 66, 2); they hoped to reach Polichna, which was in the hands of the Syr.
οἱ . . λογάδες
—see c. 100, 1.
ἦσαν γὰρ κτλ
—this gives the reason for what follows, not for what preeedes.
αὐτοῖς
=the Syr.
ξυνεφοβήθη
—‘was also put to confusion,’ like the 300. Observe the correction
φυλή for
φυλακή of the MSS. In Xen.
Hel.
IV. 2
, 19 there is a false variant,
φυλακαί for
φυλαί.
Λάμαχος
—see Intr. p. xiv.
ἑαυτῶν
—the plur. is often so used where one general among several is mentioned.
εὐθὺς κατὰ τάχος
— an instance of the tendency to multiply words, esp. adverbs, in order to obtain emphasis—
e.g.
πόθεν οἰκόθεν· αὐτοῦ ἐκεῖ. The same tendency is seen in Latin, esp. in comedy.